life. That life seemed almost as though it belonged to a distant past. How far away London seemed! How far away everything seemed—except danger!
Knowing that, however great the need of watchfulness, it would be impossible to go entirely without sleep the whole of the time until the Sagitta was due, he formed a plan of contenting himself with a comparatively short nap once a day, while the signal-room was officially occupied. As a young man he had been able to sleep just when and where he chose, and he was relying on this faculty now. At first he experienced no great difficulty in keeping awake, in spite of the little sleep he had had since landing.
He rightly attributed his wakefulness to the strangeness of his experience, and the peculiar uncanniness of the danger that threatened. He could not bring himself to expect anything to happen at night. There could be no possibility of wireless communication, for the door was locked and the key in the pocket of his coat, hanging on the peg, within easy reach of his hand. A hundred crowding thoughts passed through his mind. He lost count of time.
Macrae Under Martian Influence Is a Somnambulist
After at least a couple of hours—it may have been about midnight—the soft tread of bare feet, but distinctly audible in the stillness, was heard passing his door in the direction of the signal-room. A form was just visible as it crossed the entrance lobby.
A good deal startled at this unexpected development, the Professor rose. Going quickly to the doorway, he put out his head for a better view of the intruder. The light was just sufficient to enable him to recognize the figure of Macrae trying the signal-room door. Knowing it to be securely locked, Professor Rudge stood a few seconds awaiting events. Several times the handle was turned back, and a quiet attempt made to push open the door.
Speaking quietly, the Professor asked, "What are you doing there, Macrae?"
There was no answer, but Macrae turned and began to come back towards him, passing without taking any notice although within a foot of him. Macrae walked out of the lobby and toward his own apartment. After turning, having such light as there was upon his face, the Professor could see that Macrae was fast asleep.
Professor Rudge knew the danger of awaking a sleep-walker, and allowed him to go without further interference. He felt that he had at last something tangible. Macrae had shown him that the Martians' method was somnambulism. That made much clear to him that he had been unable to understand before. There was no longer the shadow of doubt but that Macrae was under hypnotic influence and suggestion, and was acting during sleep in obedience to another will. There could be little doubt as to whose will that was. Still, now that the Professor knew what he had to fight against—knew the enemy's plan of action—the strain was relieved and he felt safe. With the door locked there was security. To-morrow he would report the occurrence and get advice.
He drew forward a deck chair and resumed his vigil.
How slowly the time passed! Once or twice, feeling a drowsiness, the reaction from the few minutes' excitement he had experienced, he rose and went to the outer door, gazing at the wondrous pageant spread above him. Long he looked at many a familiar constellation jewelling the tropic night, and at others, southward, not so familiar. He watched their ordered ranks, their silent, ceaseless westward march. It brought his thoughts to the mysterious voice that had come to him across the zodiac, faint but clear, like the sound of a silver bell from that silvery star. Soothed by his gaze into the infinite distances, he went back again to await the remaining hours of the night.
The Key Has Been Taken from Professor Rudge's Pocket. He Attacks Macrae.
He sat in the silence, thinking more or less coherently of this and that, his head nodding, heavy with sleep.
All at once he started up, wide awake, not knowing for the moment how, or in fact, why, he found himself thus suddenly upon his feet. He would have repudiated the suggestion that he had, even for a moment, lost consciousness. That is a thing on which it is so easy to be mistaken. It was now between three and four o'clock, and except for the starlight, still dark. For a second he stood tensely listening. Then came a sound, an unmistakable sound of some one in the signal-room.
His mind instantly turned to Hughes, as the only other person who had a key—but what could he be doing there now? Either he or his assistant, in one or the other of their little apartments, was supposed to be awake, lest the gong of the call-signal should be sounded from one of the communicating stations. But it certainly had not sounded.
The Professor stretched out his arm to take the key from his jacket pocket. He was delayed a moment by the fact that it had by some means come off the peg, and was lying on the floor. He found it and searched for the key. It was gone!
With one bound he was out into the lobby, with a second into the signal-room, the door of which was wide open, and reached the signaller's seat to find Macrae in it, with the headpiece above his head, just fitting the receiver over his ears.
To seize the headpiece with one hand, and to hurl the lank figure of the somnambulist sprawling headlong on the floor with the other, was the work of a moment. He found that his own knees were shaking under him, and the perspiration pouring from him. He sank down heavily into the seat he had so lately emptied.
Macrae lay for a second or two where he had fallen. Then he began to pull himself together, and finally rose and stood, lifting his hands to his head and looking round him with an air of fear and bewilderment. The little moan that escaped him instantly brought Professor Rudge to his assistance. He had already realized that in the excitement of the moment action had preceded judgment. He regretted the roughness he had displayed, telling himself that to have seized the headpiece would have been enough.
