And The Walls Came Tumbling Down, Page 3

  Our creature comprehended this and made a sign.

  The other re-entered its artifact and went away.

  And so the situation rests.

  Eptus now agrees that the disked affair is an arti­fact but contends that so squashy and semi-liquid a creature as our specimens cannot have made any­thing so hard. There­fore, he argues, there must be another and doubt­less higher type of intelli­gence here, housed in a harder form capable of dealing with such materials.

  Podas is still trying to commu­nicate with our speci­men. It has folded itself up against an angle of the wall and floor where it again tries quite des­pe­rately at inter­vals to remove the boltik frame which prevents it from using its weapon.

  He is convinced that the slot is some­how linked with its trans­mission of thought. Eptus says this is non­sense — it has become quite clear to him that our wall inter­rupts these creatures' thought-waves, so that they fall back on a secon­dary form of com­muni­cation by marks.

  Podas objects that we were able to disting­uish the out­side creature's thought waves — some of them very clearly. To which Eptus objects that it stands to reason that we are a great deal more sen­si­tive than this soggy and revolt­ing form of life.

  Argument on such lines, it seems to me, not only can go on for some time but doubt­less will.

  Interim Report.

  Dear Zenn, I have become worried by recent develop­ments. The plain fact is that we do not know enough about these strange creatures here to keep the situa­tion firmly in hand. There is now a crowd of them with their arti­facts out­side our east wall.

  Several of our party have dis­inte­grated and I fear that more may go at any moment. The crea­tures fling the most danger­ous fre­quen­cies around, not only with­out effort but regard­less of con­se­quen­ces.

  Podas suggests that they may not know the danger in the frequencies since their pudgy bodies are un­likely to respond, that they are, in fact naturally sound-absor­bent. Fantastic as this may seem Eptus is for once inclined to support him. It is also apparently endorsed by our attempts to beam them.

  We directed a most power­ful beam upon them and ran it through a range of highly des­truc­tive fre­quen­cies. One cannot say it was entirely with­out effect. For a moment they did check and we were gratified — we thought we were near a critical length.

  They turned to look at one another with obvious puzzle­ment in their minds. Then they started to commu­nicate — it does look as if Podas were right, for they invariably accom­pany thought pro­jection with move­ment of their slots.

  As far as we could interpret they were ‘saying’ such things as, “Do you hear it too? ... It's not just my ears, is it? ... Like a funny kind of music — only it isn't music ... Not, not exactly music ... It's very queer...”

  That last seemed to be the most general reaction. So far from dis­inte­grating them it did not seem, even at full power, to do more than disturb them slightly, and puzzle them. In other words this power­ful weapon is use­less against them. And we are left some­what at a loss.

  Not caring for the situation, I decided to an­tici­pate my usual report time and give you this imme­diate current account.

  The creature which had visited us previously returned accompanied by a number of similar arti­facts. More followed later and indeed I can see still more approach­ing as I make this report.

  Before that the creature we hold here had become list­less. Podas was of the opinion that it required nourish­ment of some kind. Eptus put some sili­cates before it, but it was clearly uninterested. Podas, recalling its chemical basis, reduced some of the local growths to carbon, and offered it that — also with­out success.

  We do not wish to cause the creature un­neces­sary distress but it is diffi­cult to know what to do about it. We might try injec­ting some carbon into it if we were at all sure which of its several orifices it uses for purposes of assimi­lation.

  However the return of the other creature stimu­lated it to some activity, so that it raised itself erect again.

  Almost all the creatures that now arrived were the type with bi­fur­cated tegu­ments — a number of them being exactly similar in dark blue with metal attach­ments. Their reaction at the sight of our speci­men was much the same as that of the other at first. It was then we dis­covered how rankly care­less they are with their fre­quen­cies. Luckily how­ever, all were below danger level.

  Like the other they began by feel­ing their way along the wall of the redoubt. All their minds were and still are full of astonishment. Having discovered the length of the wall, they set about deter­mining the height, and presently there were some moving about on the roof above us.

  Nearly all of them were given to stimu­lating their blunt, upper-most pro­jec­tions where they appear to carry their minds, by friction of their upper limbs. They made use of several metallic im­ple­ments experi­men­tally but the metal was, of course, far too soft to make any impres­sion on boltik. They seemed as much at a loss to deal with us as we with them.

  But not all of them were employed in the same way. One in parti­cular remained close to its arti­fact, hold­ing a small object before its slot, and making fre­quen­cies at it. It was dear from its mind that it was describing what went on —but to whom or to what or why we cannot perceive.

  Thinking we might learn some­thing new from an ani­mate speci­men of this type, we opened our door. One of them discovered the entrance as it felt along and came in. Podas had a frame ready to prevent it making dis­tressing fre­quen­cies and we shut the door again behind.

  This seemed to cause some con­ster­nation to the others outside. By bring­ing the new speci­men close to the other one, we established fairly con­clusively the correct­ness of Podas' theory of slot-com­muni­ca­tion in the species. Both struggled to use them but, failing, remained out of com­muni­ca­tion.

  Our attention was diverted from this interes­ting dis­covery by the arrival of more arti­facts. Some of these con­tained creatures with webbed tegu­ments. These are now established as the more danger­ous. One of them, imme­diately upon emerging, uttered a frequency which was extremely pain­ful to many of us.

  Unfortunately Ankis and Falmus happened to hold just that critical period­icity and dis­integrated on the spot. The sharp report of their simul­taneous demise startled all the creatures, who began ineffec­tually to make a search for the source of it.

  We cannot learn much from our new speci­men yet. Its mind is quite chaotic with alarm. It seems parti­cu­larly dis­orga­nized by the sight of Podas' work on the first speci­men. I have already suggested to Podas that he should in­cine­rate this untidy object. I shall now insist...

  I have done so. Unfortunately the result does not seem to have had a sedative effect upon the minds of either of our other speci­mens.

  We continue to be greatly puzzled by the creature which never stops emitting noises at its instru­ment. At first we heard it alone. Now, however, we hear it con­sider­ably ampli­fied, issuing from several of the disked arti­facts, How can this be? Why should it be? There is no sense in it. The creatures here are observing for themselves the very facts he is commu­nicating. And it is very wearing to us.

  A row of the creatures out­side is now trying to com­muni­cate with our two speci­mens. They emit very strongly on a harm­less though dis­agree­able frequency with­out success. Now they are making marks on white surfaces to which our two are responding by signs.

  Another artifact with a lensed machine on top has arrived. It is directed at us by a creature standing behind it. It is quite ineffective, and does not trouble us at all.

  Still more disked arti­facts continue to arrive. All the creatures are puzzled over what to do next. In one small group they are discussing whether they shall bring some­thing — some­thing that disin­tegrates violently — I do not under­stand two specimens at the same time. One of the creatures exploring our roof has discovered the farther edge by falling o
ff it. Others have come around to pick it up, so now they are on both sides of us.

  Meanwhile, we are still trying to commu­nicate with the speci­mens. Podas has arranged a battery of ten minds concen­trating thought upon them simul­taneously. The pressure is terrific — and entirely with­out effect. They are obtuse coarse hope­less clods as insen­sitive to thought as they are to sound.

  One of the webbed creatures out­side has just emitted a frequency which has destroyed three of our party in a twink­ling. This is a shock­ing busi­ness. We are going to try our beams again.

  They are surprised — but no more. The talking creature has stopped talking. It is holding up its instru­ment as though to catch our beams. What? Stop! Stop! STOP!

  That was dreadful. Some­how our beams were coming back at us. There's a fissure in our wall, cracks in our roof. Half a dozen more of us have disinte­grated. I'm sure it was some­thing to do with that talking creature and its instru­ment — but how? I don't under­stand. Now it has started talking again.

  All the creatures are trying to trace the sounds of the disintegrations. They are very bewildered.

  The talking creature has stopped talking — that's better. But the repro­duced sound from the disked arti­facts has not stopped! How? Oh, it must be ampli­fying another crea­ture now, the reso­nan­ces are different. Queer!

  It's the sound they make — but it means noth­ing. I can catch no thought-wave connected with it. It must origi­nate somewhere else. I don't under­stand ... There, it has stopped now, and a good thing, too.

  The— Oh, merciful heaven, what a sound from those reproducers! What excru­cia­tion! An appal­ling sound! Rhythmic, pulsating, piercing, devilish! This is killing us, damn them! It's — oh! — it's shaking us to pieces—

  Dreadful... Agonizing ... Oh — oh!

  A couple of dozen have gone — Podas with them. Now Eptus—

  The whole redoubt is trembling ... That frequency ... It's almost critical... If it goes any higher ...

  Too late! The boltik has shattered. It's falling in powder round what's left of us...

  Oh! That sound — that awful sound! I can't, oh, what agony! Almost on my frequency...

  BOOK INFORMATION

  THE BEST OF JOHN WYNDHAM

  SPHERE BOOKS LIMITED

  30/32 Gray's Inn Road, London WCIX 8JL

  First published in Great Britain by Sphere Books Ltd 1973

  Copyright © The Executors of the Estate of the late John Wyndham 1973

  Anthology copyright © Sphere Books Ltd 1973

  Introduction copyright © Leslie Flood 1973

  Bibliography copyright © Gerald Bishop 1973

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The Lost Machine: Amazing Stories, 1932

  The Man from Beyond: Wonder Stories, 1934

  Perfect Creature: Tales of Wonder, 1937

  The Trojan Beam: Fantasy, 1939

  Vengeance by Proxy: Strange Stories, 1940

  Adaptation: Astounding Science Fiction, 1949

  Pawley's Peepholes: Science Fantasy, 1951

  The Red Stuff: Marvel Science Stories, 1951

  And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: Startling Stories, 1951

  Dumb Martian: Galaxy Science Fiction, 1952

  Close Behind Him: Fantastic, 1953

  The Emptiness of Space: New Worlds, 1960

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circu­lated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  Set in Linotype Times

  Printed in Great Britain by

  Richard Clay (The Chaucer Press) Ltd, Bungay, Suffolk.

  ISBN 0 7221 9369 6