The Dreamland Express Read online

* I suspected as much!

  * I don’t know how these are measured exactly.

  * All eyes.

  * I don’t know how this is done either. If I did I would stop all my hop being dashed.

  * Of course you know what these are?

  CHAPTER THE EIGHTH

  THE ADVENTURE OF THE ARMOURED GIANT

  THE red-headed guard says the adventure with the Giant happened near Yanva, and, moreover, he is very firm about it. So I suppose it did happen there, although I’ve been told that the city of Yanva was forgotten thousands of years before a train was made. You may find it marked on some old atlas.

  However, after passing this ancient spot the boys suddenly saw a castle right ahead, and before they could pull up the train had run into it. Sparks flew about and the castle turned completely over.

  It did not break up, as they expected, but tumbled over as if it were made in one piece. And as it commenced to fall, George says they saw an enormous face looking down on them from the sky.

  John did not stop. He kept steadily on, and it was some minutes later that George, who had been looking back, suddenly turned to John.

  “Shake her up, John!” he yelled. “He’s coming after us!”

  I must ask you to excuse George’s slangy terms. Of course he should have said, “It would be advisable, John, to increase our speed, I fancy, because a very large giant, who owned the castle, is pursuing us in a terrible rage.”

  George didn’t put it like that; and I much doubt if I should have said all that myself—nor would you. There really wasn’t time; so I know you will excuse George’s way of putting it.

  There was no doubt about it: a giant, armoured all over with brass plates, and carrying a club, was coming after them with tremendous strides.

  John blew into the horn with all his might, and George fed the fire like a demon.

  But the Giant seemed to be gaining. He ran like a hurricane, and the sound of his clanking armour was like thunder.

  It is quite an adventure to be chased by a mad dog. I have been, so I know. But being chased by forty pounds of mad dog is a mere trifle to being chased by twenty-five tons of hate, which is what this giant was, and I have always imagined that the boys and girls in this ancient express that day got all the breathless adventure they had been sighing for.

  Fortunately they escaped, and it was this way. Every time the Giant caught the train up he was obliged to stop to lift his great club. And this gave the little engine the chance to run away again. The last time this happened was just before a tunnel in some mountains. The train bolted into this, and out at the other end; then, turning and twisting in and out of other tunnels, it played a real game of hide and seek with the Giant, until he finally lost it as a terrier sometimes loses a rat.

  HE FINALLY LOST IT AS A TERRIER SOMETIMES LOSES A RAT

  When the children were miles away in safety, they looked back and saw the monster searching wildly about in the rocky chasms.

  John patted the Chinese bargain on a cool spot.

  “She’s almost as fast as the Baltic,” he said.

  “Almost,” George and Peter answered.

  And then peace reigned, save for the gentle babble of the engine and an occasional squeal from some part of the caravan that wanted oiling. Drowsy morning was followed by drowsier afternoon in a heat that was like a furnace. Blessed night came with coolness, and sleep within sleep.

  Then for days the train passed many things, shapes, shadows—all beautiful, but none that could be remembered very well.

  There was one thing that I might tell you about, and it was Nats who really saw it first.

  “What strange cloud-shadows,” he exclaimed, pointing straight ahead.

  They were indeed, looking rather like patterned carpets on the plains, with myriads of little points of light flickering over all. The patterns seemed to move slowly.

  When the train had approached nearer the shapes resolved themselves into an army of men on the march—millions and millions in regular battalions, with horses and elephants—and over all hung a vast cloud of dust that reached right up to the sky.

  John pulled up, and all watched the stupendous mass tramp past the train.

  “This is Darius’s army,” said the guard, consulting his brass astrolabe “They are late by half a moon. I wonder why?” he added.

  Which last was quite a strange remark from him, because there was nothing he did not seem to know.

  By the third day the children were thoroughly bored by this seemingly endless procession, and they told the guard what they thought about the soldiers—how cruel and cowardly they looked.

  “Yes, they are,” agreed the guard, bluntly, “but they would not be going to war if there were only a few thousands of them; and so you would have missed this remarkable sight. It will end soon now.”

  He was right, as usual, and shortly afterwards the last of this great army trailed away in the dust-cloud.

  And when the wolf-packs, which swarmed after it, had gone, the train gathered way once more.

  CHAPTER THE NINTH

  THE VALLEY OF MINTED GOLD

  I KNOW you have been wondering all this time if the Dream-train ran on a proper track, as every respectable train ought to do. Yes, it did. But I would not like to say the rails were perfect. They showed only here and there, and the uncanny engine found them out for itself apparently.

  John, Peter, and George took the track for granted, and were not in the least surprised when the train began to plough its way through a river of coins in the Minted Gold Valley. The boys and girls were rather amused at the musical, clinking money that was sprayed out by the wheels of the train.

  Here and there in this coin sea lay statues of kings, which looked as if they had been overturned and washed into the cañon by a great flood of money.

  As the train drove farther into the cañon, the negro watchman became strangely excited, and looked intently at the faces of the fallen kings as they passed by, or were pushed aside by the engine. None seemed to give him any satisfaction, until the engine turned one up from the depths, as a dog noses up a hidden bone, and stopped short.

  It was the statue of a black king, and when the watchman saw it he gave a great yell of joy, and patted it lovingly as it leaned drunkenly against the engine chimney. Then the watchman did some other strange things. He stood looking up at the sky, listening intently. Then suddenly, jumping from the engine, he ran over the sea of gold, and began to climb the perpendicular sides of the valley.

  I have no idea how he managed to cling to the smooth rock-face of the cliff, but he rose rapidly, getting smaller and smaller till, looking no bigger than an ant, he pulled himself over the top and was gone.

  Everyone was sorry to lose their watcher—he was such a cheery, grateful soul —and they asked themselves why he should have left them in such a hurry, till a faint dub-a-dub, dub-a-dub-dub of a drum came faintly down to their ears. It must be his people’s country up there, they said. But why they had pitched their king’s image into the cañon must for ever remain a mystery.

  THE STATUE OF THE BLACK KING

  It was all very well for Nats to explain and say that negroes sometimes drove big nails into their idols when they were cross with them, and that was probably why the watcher’s folk had pitched their king into the gorge. But why should they throw all their savings away as well? That is a bigger mystery.

  John, Peter, and George started the train once more, and tumbled the king aside, rather glad indeed to get rid of the eerie face that had stared at them over the engine chimney. Although it was midday, the light began to fade as they rode deeper and deeper into the cañon.

  All at once complete darkness reigned. It was not ordinary darkness, but the air itself was black. It was so deeply dark that not even the engine fire could be seen, and if you struck a match you could hear it catch fire but you could not see it. The air was clean and sweet to the taste.

  There was nothing for it but to stop.

  The
train came to a stand in a silence that was black like the air. Soft delicate fingers touched the children’s faces and hands, but they were not afraid.

  Then a great voice, high up, broke the silence. “Who hath charge of these little ones?” it demanded.

  “I,” answered another voice, smaller and nearer. The children knew it for the guard’s.

  “Hither,” commanded the first voice.

  Followed the swift patter of feet up a long flight of steps. The feet stopped. Then again the first voice spoke.

  “Thou hast been vigilant, O guard, through much; but through that which will yet befall thou shalt increase thy vigilance sevenfold! Go!”

  Again the quick patter of feet was heard—downwards this time—and a voice said in quite ordinary tones, “Go ahead!”

  And they went ahead, so slowly that it seemed as if the engine was feeling its way gingerly with its front wheels. Then it began to grow a little lighter as they left the black air behind them, but not much. They were still in a deep gorge, but rockier and gloomier than the canon of minted gold. All about them were vague shapes of gnarled heads carved out of the rocks. A dull glow of fire came from a deep cavern, and lightning split the gorge from end to end. Thunder battered its sides, and to make matters worse, a hurricane of wind and rain made progress well-nigh impossible. John, Peter, and George hung on and nursed the rickety engine along, foot by foot. Up a steep hill they crept, until they could just see the end of the gorge.

  GROWL-LAND

  George and Peter faintly heard John’s voice above the riot.

  “She’ll just do it,” he was saying, “and only just.”

  With a last desperate effort the engine pulled the train out of the gorge, and ran away at such a speed that John, Peter, and George were nearly shaken off.

  And very glad indeed the little travellers were to get out of such trouble. They did not know, and perhaps never will know, what I am going to tell you. It is a great secret. The unhappy place they had just left was called Growl-land—where the thunder they heard was made up of all the “shan’ts” and “won’ts” ever said. The lightning was made of all the angry glances ever given, and the storm was made of all those tears that ought not to have been shed. Of course, I wouldn’t suggest for a moment that you have helped to make up the miserable things that are in Growl-land. Not for worlds would I! The trouble is all caused by faults in other people, though I think it is very likely they have grown out of such habits by now.

  For some days and nights after this the times were quite restful— just trundling over a great prairie covered with bushes, which harboured curiously shaped animals such as the children had not seen before—and did not wish to see again.

  It was otherwise with the learned boy, Nats. He had to be restrained by force many times, or the caravan would have been overrun with ugly things that bit, stung, and scratched.

  The red-headed guard, indeed, theatened to put him in irons when he caught him studying something that no one would think of looking at if they could help it—much less put in a box.

  Nats was not happy (nor any of the others) until the train had left the prairie and stopped abruptly with the engine on the brink of a river—a dark rushing river that slid out of a cleft in some high cliffs.

  The rails ended abruptly on the edge, but were continued on the opposite bank. Anybody could have seen that a bridge was missing.

  Even the guard said, “Gone again! T-T-T! why can’t he leave things alone?”

  Who “he” was will now be told.

  CHAPTER THE TENTH

  SOTER

  The whole party stood disconsolately on the river bank until they heard something or someone coming from the cleft in the cliffs.

  All lined up on the river bank, watching the bend in the gorge. Someone was coming down the river, someone singing with a great and splendid voice, and the sound of it made you go all “quaky” inside.

  The song went something like this:

  “Mine the sun, the wind and the rain,

  Till night shall come again;

  Sweet earth my couch shall be,

  Starlight my canopy,

  Beloved dawn.”

  And then—a vast man swung into sight, and when the sun shone on his tight little golden curls, they knew at once that this was their kind of Giant, and not the least like the bristly horror that had nearly chased the life out of them but a short time before.

  He was nothing like so big, but he strode down the river beating the water into creamy foam with mighty legs.

  “Greetings, children!” he roared, waving; and the children jumped about and cheered like mad in answer.

  He was quite young and splendidly strong; stronger than ten carthorses. He was clothed in dappled skins over some white under-garment, and he screwed up his eyes and laughed as he sat down on the river bank; and the children felt they had known him all their lives. He had those fine six-a-side shoulders and knees, and he managed to accommodate all of them somewhere about him: all except two, the guard and Nats; and there was much that was comforting about his rich brown skin, damp with spray though it was.

  “I came as quickly as I could,” he said to them, “but I’m very sorry about your bridge—the fact is, I borrowed it to help a king’s army across the river—a beaten army it was. It’s rather a long way off now—what you would call a hundred miles—but I will get you across somehow.”

  And then everybody forgot all about the bridge and the train; they asked in the nicest possible manner for stories. At first he didn’t remember any, but afterwards he had wonderful tales to tell.

  The guard wasn’t interested at all—he paced up and down studying his time-tablets very hard.

  Nats made himself a nuisance—according to custom. He occupied himself by a critical examination of the skins that made up the Giant’s coat. It takes a lot of skins to clothe a man of that size. Nats was actually seen to cut a piece off one of them.* Then walking round to the front of the Giant, he mounted one of the great knees, pushed aside the others, and thrust the piece of skin before the Giant’s eyes.

  “Where did you get that?” demanded Nats, breathlessly.

  “That?” answered the Giant, without taking any notice of Nats’ rudeness. He looked at the fragment, but you could see his eyes did not take it in, but something a long way off.

  “I remember,” he continued; “that came off the back of a horned horse, down in the south lands where the sun sits right down on your head.”

  “Homed horse?” demanded Nats. “How —”

  “Like this,” said the Giant, and he put his finger straight out from his forehead.

  “Oh! a unicorn?” gasped Nats. “I didn’t know there were such things!”

  “Oh! didn’t you?” said the Giant sweetly. “Look here,” and he showed them four round, long-healed scars on his legs; “the animal made those. He was a very nasty beast indeed, and jumped about like lightning; but I caught him, at last—as you see.”

  That story of the elephants came up after the girls had made a cup of tea for the Giant. You can imagine what a small china cup and saucer looked like in his great palm! He must have felt like a boy at a dolls’ tea-party.

  He drank the tea in amazement.

  “What delicious warm water,” he cried. And he was so charmed that they brewed a great bowl of it with hot water from the engine.

  “The tea is from Ceylon,” they told him, as they emptied two packets each of tea and sugar into the water.

  “Silan?” said he, and his eyebrows went up five inches. “Not the scented isle? Why—I was there once, long ago, and I encountered some great beasts. They prodded me with their teeth, and wrapped their long noses about my legs so that I could scarce get about; but I pummelled them with my fists and they fled squealing into the forest, flapping their head-wings.”

  “Head-wings?” asked a voice—Nats’ of course.

  “Yes!” said the Giant, and he wagged his open hands beside his head.

  “
Oh! of course. Elephants,” said Nats.

  Then the guard scrambled up and, shoving Nats away, he opened out his time-tablets on the Giant’s mighty chest.

  “Listen to me, Mr. Soter,” he said; “I’m sick of this foolery. We are three weeks behind time—not three minutes, but three weeks,” and he banged the book hard with his fist.

  The Giant didn’t let him finish; he took the time-tablets and gently stuffed them into the guard’s belt.

  “Be patient, O thou with the head of flame,” laughed the Giant. “I will carry your caravan over, and when we come to the sad parting, I will give you such a shove off that you will get to Microla in no time. Don’t you see? That will make your time-tablets right.”

  Then he took off the guard’s cap and ruffled his smooth hair, to the huge delight of the boys and girls. It was something they wouldn’t dare do themselves, but they laughed gleefully when someone else did it.

  So the guard had to content himself fuming up and down on the river bank. Then the children begged for more stories. They knew quite well that this was just the sort of man to have had wonderful adventures. Of course the Giant told them lots—so many that there is not room to write them here.

  And then it was time to prepare for the parting. You know, I am sure, when the real time for a parting comes, however much you may put it off—you feel it inside you. Everybody then felt like that.

  And, one by one, the engine and train were unhooked and Sotor carried them over.

  He had a tremendous job with the engine, but managed to get it on his back, and carried it over and carefully put it on the rails on the other side of the river. Then the Giant straightened himself up.

  “Phew!” he said. “But your little fire chariot is hot as well as heavy.”

  However, all breathed freely, because the river was full of deep potholes that didn’t show on its surface. Then came the carriages one by one; these were easy. Then the boys and girls enjoyed a ride across. The Giant took them in bunches, and it was altogether most exciting and enjoyable.