The Romance of Atlantis Page 2

  “And now, thy dear self, my daughter, my beloved! Whatever thou dost, forswear the rejuvenation chamber. It is enough for man to live the natural span of seventy-five years. There are too many memories to live with when life is prolonged beyond what nature intended. We become jaded with the things that pleasured once, until we yearn for nothing but endless oblivion. Come not to that, dear daughter.”

  For a long time he lay in silence, his lidded eyes sunken in his gray face. Tyrhia sobbed afresh, but none heeded her. The physician shook his head, and moistened the dry lips with a wet cloth.

  The Emperor was not through. He held up a finger. “But be jealous in how thou guardest the rejuvenation chamber. Hold it up as a constant reward for loyalty and achievement, but grant it only once in a lifetime, else in the experiencing it will lose its enchantment, and thou wilt no longer have this inducement to dangle before the ignorant.”

  Lazar stirred faintly. “My daughter,” he went on, “thou mayest desire to marry. But think long before thou takest on so burdensome an anchor. Yet I would not advise a dull life of continence. Have thy lovers. Have thy lovers, indeed, but be judicious. Take only those thy equal in intelligence. To take less would be to court boredom and self-contempt. But marriage—ah, my daughter, I would not advise that for thee.”

  He fumbled for his younger daughter’s hand. “Thy sister, my poor little Tyrhia, into thy hands I commend her, knowing thou wilt love her as I do.

  “And now, Salustra, I have some hard-won philosophy to whisper to thee. Thou mayest scoff at it, but I have found it true after a double lifetime of power. Better to appreciate a sunset than to be lord of a thousand conquered cities. The man that can be moved by music is happier than he whose acclaim is shouted from the hilltops. The soul grows not by material things, but only by thought. If a man thinketh not, even though he sitteth upon a throne, his soul is still in embryo.” He seemed to have come to the end of his valedictory. His breath rattled in his throat. She bent low to catch his last feeble word. “To thee, Salustra, I commend my people. If I know consciousness beyond that dark gulf yawning between us, I shall make every effort to see thee and to guide thy hand. For these are troubled times for our dear Atlantis.”

  With a sigh that was almost a groan, he fell back.

  The doctor picked up the Emperor’s limp wrist. He shook his head with an expression of grief. “The Emperor is no more,” he said. “Long live the Empress.”

  It was not until the Emperor had died that Salustra wept. And then she threw her body over her father’s and sobbed until it was time to carry him away. It was well that she did this, for it was the last time for years she was to know the luxury of tears. As she stood there, she knew not whether she mourned more her father’s passing or the terrible responsibility that was now hers.

  She had pleaded with her father to visit the rejuvenating Temple Beautiful once again, but he had explained it would be to no purpose. “The gods allow no man to live more than two centuries. And it is well, for the gods know more than man.” He had smiled thinly, as she recalled, saying, “When your time comes, daughter, you will better know what I mean.” He had gestured to the heavens. “Who knows but what there is something better on the dark side of the sky, something that gives meaning to our empty pursuit of happiness?”

  She had been too young to grasp the full portent of his words, and saw no reason why life’s benefits should not be expanded indefinitely. As it was, only a favored few among the elite were even considered for Temple Beautiful and the special rays which reactivated the cells and restored the endocrine balance of the glands. Wrinkles disappeared, hair was restored, muscles and circulation renewed, and the years miraculously shorn away, except for what remained in the heart and mind. Lazar had received the rejuvenating rays first when he was seventy-five, and again at one hundred and forty. The second time, he was already tired of life and would have preferred the Unknown. But as yet then he had no heir.

  No woman had ever achieved the Temple Beautiful, for none, until Salustra mounted the throne, had the opportunity to merit this reward. Salustra herself knew of nobody deserving this distinction, except old Mahius, her father’s First Minister, and he soon pleaded for her not to prolong a life already freighted with one rejuvenation experience.

  With tears in his eyes, he had appealed to her better nature. “I deserve better at your hands, Majesty.”

  “Where can I find another like you?” she had rejoined sadly. “Who but you will stand firm with me when the hordes descend from the north?”

  2

  How stupid were these men, the Empress thought. For a week now, as a low, swirling mist hung over the land, Atlantis had been in the grip of a mysterious power shortage. Nothing operated by solar or nuclear energy could move—neither vessels of the sea nor land craft nor the ships of the air. All rapid communication via the vibrations of the atmosphere was at a halt, electrical energy was at a standstill, and it seemed as if the very empire must fall apart at the seams. And yet these men, these stupid men, were driveling nonsense for hours, inconsequential nonsense, which not only had no bearing on the present crisis but was also irrelevant to any of the immediate internal and external threats confronting the stricken nation.

  As matters stood now, the Empress had been sitting in Council with the Nobles and Commoners for many hours, and the conversation had been more than usually oppressive. She moved restlessly upon her throne and tapped the floor irritably with a foot. Her eyes idly roamed the Council Chamber, passing from the walls of gleaming white marble to the tremendous soaring columns and the vaulted ceiling, so lofty that the upper pillars were lost in hazy shadows. Her gaze shifted to the center of the vast chamber, where a fountain featured a nymphlike figure holding aloft a torch so brilliant it illuminated the entire chamber. The Empress’ eyes then returned to the twelve Nobles representing the aristocracy of the Twelve Provinces and the twelve Commoners representing the people of the Twelve Provinces. The Empress barely heard what they were saying. The Empress was unspeakably bored, her mind vaguely preoccupied with the power stoppage that threatened to paralyze the nation. Yet, as always, she looked serenely majestic. Her robes, heavily brocaded with gold, barely concealed the smooth roundness of her bosom and her gleaming shoulders. Her hair was lightly braided with pearls, and on her head rested the crown of Atlantis with its twelve points, one for each province. Her face, with its cold, indifferent beauty, gave the impression of an impassive nature. Against the pallor of her face, her full mouth provided an arresting touch of color. Her nose was a trifle too high and arrogant; the turn of her head expressed too obviously an easy imperiousness. Her frown perhaps was too pronounced. About her throat was her father’s necklace, heavy links of polished gold fastened by the sparkling gem, which became a circle of fire in the warm hollow of her throat. Despite this energizer, stimulating the body, she was mentally very tired. One of the Nobles was speaking, his voice a dull drone in her ears. She looked beyond him to the slumbering Mount Atla. Through the blur of a heavy haze, a suggestion of red shone above the purple crags and peaks. Below, the blue bosom of the bay gently rose and fell, and great ships dipped and bowed at anchor while others dove underneath waves occasionally to mine the ocean floor for precious minerals, copper, uranium, nickel, cobalt, magnesium, gold, silver and many rare alloys. She turned her head, and the city struck her eye with a dazzling white light. The city climbed upward, until great pillars and walls and shining domes mingled together in a vast forest of gleaming stone. She frowned; she hated her capital of Lamora. Her best efforts had not been entirely successful in banishing dirt and disease and noisome spots. She remembered what her father had once told her: “One cannot teach courtesy to asses, nor cleanliness to hogs.” So, despite the pearl-like whiteness of the city at a distance, she knew that narrow alleys and fetid streets lurked behind the pillars and domes and the shining walls. She had had great trees planted in the main streets and the vast parks, the fresh greenery making vivid patches in the glittering stone
. But many died of the stagnant air and others became wilted through neglect. Above all, there came from the city a ceaseless murmur, a distinctive, throbbing hum, which reflected the soul of the inhabitants, ebbing and flowing like the changing sound of the sea.

  As her eyes returned to the Council Chamber, she looked absently at a large relief map carved in color upon a marble wall. It showed a mighty continent. The whole continent was called Atlantis, but only the central section was really the nation of Atlantis. Mighty Althrustri, to the north and west, was as vast in territory as Atlantis but was a land of endless pine forests, frozen lakes, bleak mountains, breathtaking precipices and terrible stretches of virgin snow and ice. The upper fringe of the continent was white with snow for most of the year, but Atlantis proper had a versatile climate. It was livably cold in the north, with a pleasant summer, warm and temperate in the central portions, and hot and languorous in the south. In the south, in the First Province, was Lamora, the capital, with seven million inhabitants. South of Atlantis was a cluster of tiny island principalities, Mantius, Dimtri, Nahi, Letus, Antilla and Madura. The Emperor Lazar had guarded their independence as an indulgent lion would his cubs.

  At one time Lazar had taken his daughters on a journey across the continent. They had visited all of the Twelve Provinces. Seven were industrious, with thriving cities and broad fertile areas. Some, distinctly urban, boasted large manufacturing centers. Others were agricultural, with small towns and hidden villages. Two were indolent, shiftless provinces, feeding on the rest. Two were thinly populated, with dense matted forests, rocky gorges and a sparse soil that made life too precarious for a soft generation. In a vast region comprising large parts of three provinces, there was an endless swamp and jungle. Here, baboons, monkeys, lions, crocodiles and elephants, which had somehow reappeared after the dinosaurs vanished, filled the tropic nights with their cries. Another province was a great, gray desert, unoccupied save for creatures of the sand.

  Lamora, the bloated capital, felt vastly superior to its sister states. Life here was hectic, gay and abandoned. The other provinces called it the sewer of Atlantis, but to the Lamorans it was the center of the earth. Here abounded the most famous poets, artists, philosophers, the most accomplished mountebanks, the most profound scientists, the most beautiful courtesans. Its luxury was famous from the icy glaciers of Althrustri to the warm tropical waters of Letus. Each year, thousands of Althrustrians had seeped into the country, almost as an advance invasion force, lured by the wealth and comforts and opportunities of this favored land. Life was not hard and grim in Atlantis as it was in Althrustri, and laws here were more benign and tolerant. From other lands, too, the poorest class of immigrants flowed into Atlantis, the adventurers, the paupers, the incompetent, the biologically inferior, having found existence too strenuous in their own country.

  Lazar, during the latter years of his life, had been concerned by this inferior bloodstream seeping across his borders. He had advocated a rigid immigration law, which would screen applicants for admission. But influential manufacturers, greedy for new markets, successfully protested this rigidity. Atlanteans demanded too large a wage scale, and profits were hardly more than two hundred percent. Lazar had spoken to Salustra about his proposed reform months before his death, but she had never mustered the votes to push the measure through the Council.

  Salustra had been thinking about many things, none of them remotely touching the Noble Consul Lustri, of the Eighth Province, or anything that he was saying now. Her eyes rested upon him with a detached curiosity. Lustri was a handsome young man of the purest aristocracy, prominent in the licentious life of the city. He had great charm, a magnetic smile. His wealth was reputedly as limitless as his debaucheries. Rumor had it that he was the Empress’ lover. But if so, she was already tired of his limited repertoire. Her nimble intellect demanded a kindred spirit. Lustri was a charming playmate, a delightful lover, a stimulating companion, but he could never breach the wall behind which Salustra suffered the isolation of the great.

  She now caught a few words that Lustri was saying. He was standing before her throne, his dark eyes fixed upon her with confident boldness. Nobles and Commoners alike regarded him enviously. The Empress, they thought, could deny him nothing. Lustri represented the most dissolute elements of the turbulent Eighth Province, which experienced more crimes of violence than all the other provinces collectively. Each province made its own local laws, subject only to national statutes, and was authorized to raise taxes for the national treasury and to furnish a certain quota of men for the army.

  There were two large cities in Lustri’s state, and neither the national nor the local police body could effectively maintain order, as the poor were practically in a state of revolt. Because of widespread corruption of public officials, taxes were often extracted only by force, and rebellion, sparked by poverty, smoldered close to the surface. Tax monies were squandered illicitly, diverted from legitimate public projects.

  Roads had fallen into disrepair, thousands stood idle in the cities; vast agricultural regions lay fallow. The dissolute aristocracy found it impossible to gather taxes for the national treasury. They had induced Lustri, as their representative, to plead with the Empress for an emergency moratorium on taxes. The neighboring Ninth Province was industrious and prosperous, and the lords of the Eighth Province proposed that a larger tax be imposed on their more fortunate neighbor to make up their deficiency.

  Lustri argued his case well, his smiling eyes fastened eloquently, as though sharing some special secret, on her Imperial Highness. As he smiled, he painted her a pathetic picture of the economic miseries of his Eighth Province. His lips openly called for a little more time; some understanding of the Eighth’s problems and a larger imposition, only temporarily, to be sure, on the Ninth Province. Meanwhile, his eyes conveyed another message to this beautiful woman, as he remembered the hours when her bosom had been pressed to his, and he had felt the accelerated beat of her heart. He recalled the scent of her hair, the softness of her lips, and his glance let her know that. He was sure that she too remembered.

  As he was speaking, one man in the Assembly had risen indignantly, restrained only by the forceful urging of his comrades. He was a tall, spare, middle-aged man, his blue eyes startlingly pale in a deeply tanned face. He was the Commoner from the Ninth Province.

  Not missing any of this drama, the Empress raised her hand, and Lustri paused. Her manner was gentle and almost detached. As if ignoring the Commoner, she nodded to the Noble, Gatus, from the Ninth Province, kinsman to Lustri, and he came forward eagerly, kneeling gratefully to touch Salustra’s golden slipper with his forehead.

  “My Lord Gatus, thou hast heard the plea of the Lord Lustri,” she said. “What hast thou to say to this? Art thou and thy people willing that this should be so?”

  Gatus looked at her closely, but her gaze was inscrutable. Lustri smiled inwardly, a confident and triumphant smile. He tried to catch the eye of the Empress for a secret glance of appreciation, but she did not look in his direction.

  Gatus hesitated for a moment, apparently perplexed, then bowed in assent. Immediately, Publius, the Ninth Commoner, with an angry cry, broke from his comrades and sprang before the Empress’ throne. His eyes flashed with righteous scorn as he glanced at the faintly smiling Gatus and Lustri. “Most gracious Majesty, I protest this rapacious assault on my people!” cried the Commoner. “We work too hard to be the object of such a conspiracy by the Nobles.”

  Salustra looked at the Commoner with surprise. Several Nobles stepped forward to join Lustri and Gatus, and, like their fellows, they held their hands lightly on their ceremonial swords, ready to avenge this boorish affront to their Empress.

  Salustra motioned them back with a languid hand, leaving Lustri and Gatus and the Commoner standing before the throne.

  She beckoned first to the Commoner. “Publius, come forward, and tell me why I should not impose this tax upon thy more prospering people.”

  Lustri, supremely
confident, toyed with the jeweled hilt of his sword. Gatus, smiling uneasily, traced the juncture of two marble sections in the floor with a nervous foot.

  Publius stretched out his hands passionately. His voice rang with righteous wrath. “How unjust,” he deplored, “for the industrious to pay the piper for the indolent. Why then should any man strive or labor, to what purpose?”

  The Empress sat musing, her eyes fixed on the floor. She looked at neither Lustri nor Publius. Suddenly, she smote the side of her throne with her palm, her eyes flashed. “I deny the petition of the Lord Lustri,” she said in a clear voice.

  A subdued murmur, like a gathering wind, passed over the Assembly. The Nobles eyed each other in amazement:

  malignant glances previously concealed by fear were cast at the discomfited Lustri, who was staring at the Empress with dazed, unbelieving eyes.

  Lustri was visibly trembling, and beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. He put out a quavering hand in a gesture almost of supplication. As she watched him with veiled eyes, her mouth curled a little.

  “But most gracious Majesty,” began Lustri in a subdued voice scarcely above a whisper. “I would implore further consideration. There must be a mistake!”

  The Empress’ hand moved slowly to her throat, and her slim fingers played with the gem there. She gave him a glance that reduced him to an awareness of the gulf between them.

  “I have considered,” she said dispassionately. “I do not understand why industry and prosperity should be penalized for inferiority and criminality. That is all.”

  Lustri looked stricken. “That is all?” he whispered, moistening his lips.

  The Empress coldly inclined her head.

  His face the color of chalk, Lustri bowed and withdrew to a bench, where a group of frozen-faced Nobles moved slightly away from him.