The House of a Thousand Floors (CEU Press Classics) Page 14

  And that was how Brok made his way into the rebels' camp.

  A dark space, bleeding with torchlight. — They have no spotlights here, Brok thought ruefully — not one single lamp. but they were preparing for something on the staircase: the torches were moving up and down in energetic arcs and underneath them were suspended the red blotches of faces. The bodies dressed in rags disappeared, swallowed by darkness.

  It was not easy for Brok to slip unnoticed through the commotion of bodies and torches. He wanted to speak to Vítek. But where and how could he find him?

  At the top of the staircase, the floor continued into the distance beyond the ruins of collapsed walls. Brok's eyes took time to become accustomed to the flickering blood-red light of the torches with clouds of thick smoke and sizzling drops of burning pitch.

  XLI

  The prophet number 794 "...I will then destroy the living Moloch l" · The headquarters · Brok introduces himself to Vítek of Vítkovice · "Postpone your attack until tomorrow... "

  On top of a heap of rubble in a desolate open space behind a collapsed wall stood an old man surrounded by the light of flames. — Above his head a hole gaped in the ceiling, as if it had been left there by the devil himself. The old man loomed terribly above the multitude of slaves and he was blind.

  Brok shivered. He was surprised to recognise the blind veteran number 794 whom he had found at the end of his long climb up the staircase. In the blood-red light of the torches he looked like the last apostle who had gathered a hunted herd at the bottom of a catacomb.

  "I had waited for ten years," he spoke in an excited voice, "until one day... the wall opened up... A mere human could not have come from there! It was him, our long-awaited Redeemer, the Carrier of Light! He came to lead us out of this Hell of a thousand floors! Woe to Muller — a thousand times woe!

  The hour of punishment has come!

  Rise against him and overthrow the yoke of slavery!

  Because he said: 'I shall bring you back the sun and love and desires and dreams!'

  I will lead you out of the captivity of Mullerdom back to your homes!

  And he also said: 'Now I shall descend! I shall work for you below so that you can work for me here!'"

  A voice called form the crowd:

  "If your new god is so powerful, why doesn't he himself destroy Muller so that we can enter Gedonia without

  bloodshed?"

  The old man cried: "You coward! Did he not say: 'The staircases shall be lit by torches and the ceilings of floors shall burst like drums pierced with a dagger!'

  There will be bloodshed on a scale never seen before on the stars! The blood of enemies shall rise and flow over the barricades like over weirs, and flood the staircases like a waterfall."

  Then another voice called:

  "Muller promises us life after death on the stars. What does your new god promise us beyond the grave?"

  The old man raised his finger to the ceiling through which darkness tumbled down the jagged hole.

  "He said: can anything worse or anything better befall you than death? Death, good and quiet, dreamless, like the sleep of a blind child?"

  Someone from the crowd protested:

  "Why should we think about death when we are going to enjoy the pleasures of Gedonia? We'll send the heaven-dwellers with their full stomachs to take our places in slavery. And we will take their places at the feast, enjoying heaven on earth!"

  "Woe betide you if you want to make your stomachs into new gods!" shouted the prophet.

  "For He said: 'Enter his temples and bedchambers and dining rooms, chase out false prophets and merchants and sybarites, and your hands will be clean!

  You shall topple the idols of Moloch and I shall then destroy the living Moloch himself!'"

  Many left the prophet's crowd grumbling and joined another one. There another blind man promised the heavenly joys of Gedonia.

  Brok remained with the old man along with a handful of the faithful, listening to his excited prophecies with great interest. He marvelled at how the clever old man thought of using an accidental meeting with him to create a new religion in support of Vítek of Vítkovice! — For a moment, he wanted to manifest his presence so that the crowd would believe the blind prophet but then thought better of it.

  He was worried that he might lose sight of his mission and he thought it was high time for him to return to the 100th floor and finish what he had started.

  Several signs with arrows pointed the way to the leader. Brok climbed up ladders and through openings in ceilings from floor to floor. At last he stood in front of a door bearing the sign:

  He slipped inside together with an exhausted messenger who had just returned from somewhere.

  At an oak table, surrounded by his generals, Vítek of Vítkovice sat poring over a map of the Mullerdom battlefield. He was a young man with a shock of dishevelled raven-black hair like darkness itself. He had grey eyes, pale, firmly set lips, a large sensitive nose and an energetic chin as if chiselled from granite. He was chain-smoking, his fingers yellow from nicotine.

  "Vítek!" the messenger gasped — "the breakthrough was not successful!"

  Vitek's expression remained unchanged. He bent over the map, a plan of floor 490, and stuck a little black flag into one of the squares. There were already three.

  The messenger gave a breathless account of what had happened:

  "In the spot you had just marked, a company of sappers dug their way into sand! The whole space under the floor of that bedroom was filled with sand up to the ceiling. And there were mines hidden in it. One exploded when it was hit by a pickaxe. Two brothers are dead and five injured."

  The faces over the map darkened.

  "Accursed floor!"

  "This is the fourth time!"

  "Everywhere there is sand and nothing but sand!"

  "Could those scoundrels have filled an entire floor with sand from top to bottom?"

  "It seems that we've taught them how to be clever," said Vítek. "They have guards in all the rooms. The moment they hear shots overhead, they call for back-up and fill the space with sand before we manage to break through."

  Another messenger arrived. — Vitek's face showed signs of tension. "Well?"

  "Sand," panted the messenger.

  Vítek bit his lip so hard it bled. Another black flag joined the others on the map. "We have no choice but to storm the barricade," he said darkly. "Today!"

  He pointed with his finger at another map. — It was long, showing a cross-section of the entire Mullerdom from foundations to the roof. Openings in ceilings and the main lines of the staircases were marked with red flags.

  The generals bent over the maps started speaking again:

  "It will be a difficult task!"

  "There are still 98 floors to go to reach Universe!" "We've only got enough drinking water left for 144 hours!"

  "And enough wine for 60 hours!"

  "Then we'll have to turn to West-Wester spirits!"

  "Dream powders, bliss pills and cocaine!"

  "Woe betide us!"

  "Only Universe's airships can save us!" "It's 98 floors, brother!"

  "Brutus!" Vítek turned to one of the generals. "This very night you will lead an attack on barricade number 9. The second barriers will not be any stronger since the black mercenaries are preparing an offensive. Get five thousand men ready and wait for my orders!"

  Then, all of a sudden, Petr Brok spoke:

  "Vítek of Vítkovice!"

  They all jumped up and looked at each other in astonishment.

  But Brok continued:

  "Postpone your attack to another day. — If you carry it out tonight, you'll be responsible for the extermination of your army!"

  Vítek was the first one to collect himself. He shouted:

  "Whose voice is this?"

  And the voice introduced itself:

  "I am Petr Brok!"

  "Are you the new god prophet 794 has been talking about?"

 
"I'm not a god! — I've come to warn you not to attack tonight."

  "Why?"

  "Don't ask! — Listen to me and you'll see for yourself tomorrow!"

  "I believe you and I'll listen to you! — The attack will be postponed..."

  Brok disappeared, leaving behind him a tent full of astonishment and joy.

  XLII

  The sacks will leak from underneath... · The red triangle · Old Schwartz's boredom · Before I grow old... · Button number 100

  In all the spaces he passed through, the rebels were getting ready to go to sleep. A single torch lit the main staircase. Brok quickly slipped through the small gate in the metal barricade. He took a few steps and found himself in front of the enemy barricade. Quietly he climbed over it.

  Two men were sitting on crates in the golden spotlight. One of them, a youth, was looking through the barricade. The other was smiling with all the wrinkles in his face. — It was old Schwartz. "Tonight I can sleep peacefully," he lisped, nodding his shrivelled head. "If they try something, we'll fire a few times, just for fun. We'll pretend to defend our positions desperately as if we were leaving behind our young. We will, of course, be forced to flee and that's when we'll hide behind the concrete one floor down. In the meantime, they'll run wild here, like lice."

  "And what if they discover the barrels with your gas? .

  What then?"

  "They won't, rest assured, my boy. The barrels are filled with wine and the sacks floating in them will be leaking from underneath. and there are other barrels, completely innocuous. The ones containing gas are marked with a red triangle and there's one in each corner.

  When the signal is given."

  "You have set it up well, grandpa. But what if the robots lie down somewhere else, far from your barrels?"

  "They won't, you greenhorn, I've thought it through ... I had it all worked out before you were born. They'll settle around the staircase, like us. Vítek won't let them go any further so they don't get carried away in the bars. do you understand?"

  "And what if they follow you in the lift?"

  "Ah, you little baby... if Vítek had access to the mechanism of the lift, they'd already be riding up and down and having fun in Gedonia, see? You're still wet behind the ears. aaaah!"

  He opened his toothless mouth in a round yawn.

  Brok didn't waste any time: he grabbed a wad of cotton wool and stuffed it into the black hole of the old man's open mouth. Then he turned to the curious "baby" and, before he knew what was happening, made him — still gaping — keel over with a single blow to the temple.

  In the meantime, the old man proved to be surprisingly quick — he wanted to escape but Brok caught his leg, pulled him back, and tied him up with a long piece of string.

  "Fear not, grandpa," he whispered into the old man's astonished eyes. "Sio is not going to harm you! Or are you scared you might shrink by another hundred years?"

  Then he took care of the youth, secured him with a string and gag, and quietly crept away towards the tents. The camp was asleep.

  Brok then promptly silenced several bored guards. He immediately recognised the barrels marked with red triangles; he could see rubber hoses tied with a string sticking out from underneath. Brok untied them.

  As he released the last one, he felt faint. A red triangle bore painfully into his brain. Brok felt he was losing consciousness, but he gathered all his strength to stay awake.

  Away! Away! — Before I turn old!

  He staggered forward.

  Three more steps — the lift!

  One more step — before I fall! At last, with the red triangle painfully branding his brain, he leapt into the lift. Button number 100! 100! 100! Brok collapsed.

  XLIII

  The 100th floor · "You fell for it, Seagull!" Above all, find Muller · These were Muller's bodyguards · His library

  He dreamt he was lying on a cool bed looking up at the ceiling. It was perfectly white, but in the centre of it was a red triangle. It is so bright, so unbearably red and it is bearing down on his brain with dull pain. It is as if the triangle had a hole in it and someone was trying to force his round skull inside. Ah, if it were not for the triangle...! He would feel so good here! The ceiling is sugar white, so much so that you can feel the sweetness on your tongue. A milky light bulb is suspended from it, like a sleepy water lily bud. Then suddenly — a jolt! What happened? Ah, yes! — The 100th floor!

  The open door of the lift, the palm grove, the humming rainbow bridge.

  Brok was about to cross the bridge but he stopped at the last moment.

  It was impossible!

  He would be betrayed.

  Muller would immediately be able to tell that someone was coming into his residence uninvited. — It wasn't just a bridge — it was the arc of a harp and every guest had to play it with his steps under the windows of Mul-ler's palace!

  He had no choice but to wait and time his footsteps to synchronise with those of another visitor.

  Brok didn't have to wait long. He heard the crunch of gravel on the footpath and then none other than Lord Humperlink himself emerged amidst the palm trees. It was indeed him, the Seagull! The last person Brok expected to see! What was he doing here? — A painful memory of the princess passed through his mind. — What had become of her?

  The lord set out to cross the bridge without hesitating and Brok kept step with him. — The bridge sounded a melancholy melody that still echoed as they stood at the gate of the palace.

  The Seagull submitted to all the procedures required before an audience with Muller, hastily but with pleasure, and at last, dressed in the white attire of a Roman patrician, he stood before Mullerdom's idol.

  The bloated Ohisver Muller was again sitting in his place, his belly in his lap, a round smile above his mighty double-pointed beard.

  "Oh Lord!" Humperlink cried, touching the carpet with his forehead. "I carried out your order!"

  "What order?" the voice boomed from inside the figure.

  "I took Princess Tamara back to the Kingdom of

  Moravia!"

  Brok gave a sigh of relief.

  "Is that what I ordered?" the voice thundered.

  "I obeyed your voice, oh Lord!"

  The Seagull then briefly recounted how he had been called, how at first he had been suspicious and had come out with a revolver in his hand, and how he had then obeyed after making sure that the VOICE was indeed coming from the ceiling.

  "You were tricked!" came the screeching reply. "You swallowed the hook; you are not a seagull but an ass! That was not my voice! You obeyed the voice of the devil! — Go back at once! Bring the entire fleet into action! It will be at your service! — But do not come back without the princess! Away with you!"

  Lord Humperlink disappeared and Brok remained alone in the hall. — He knew he had to act quickly because his Princess was in danger.

  He had to complete his mission!

  First of all, he had to find Muller!

  Search the Palace! All the rooms, alcoves and niches, knock on all the walls, floors and ceilings...

  Brok tiptoed to the black curtain behind the throne. He pulled it aside only to find a glass wall dividing the royal chamber in the middle. He squeezed into the other half through a small door. How different this was from the royal half with its bright throne!

  Surrounded by a wild primitive mess of the mercenary trade, a dozen muscular half-naked men with shaven square Roman faces were lying around, forming an insane tableau. Their transparent death-resistant helmets and shields were strewn among the mats on which they snored.

  They were Ohisver Muller's bodyguards!

  Petr Brok tiptoed past them and headed down a long narrow corridor up a winding set of steps until he stood in front of another small door!

  Four walls tiled from floor to ceiling with spines of books, some thick, some slim, some massive like the trunk of an old oak, no longer books.

  Let's see, this must be Muller's library!

  That
could only mean that Muller himself couldn't be far away! Brok opened a few books lying on the table.

  Hymns and Odes

  Celebrating the Immortal Muller

  A Book of Prayers

  to the Highest God Muller

  How Ohisver Muller

  Conquered the World

  Great History

  Ohisver Muller's Conquest of the Stars

  History of the Universe

  Ohisver Muller's

  Heaven and Hell

  The Thousand Faces of Ohisver Muller

  How Mullerdom Was Constructed

  A Guide to Mullerdom

  Gedonia and Its Pleasures

  The Human Loves of Ohisver Muller

  How He Loved the World

  OHISVER MULLER

  GOD AND MAN

  PHILOSOPHY

  Brok understood that this terrible harvest of books on all shelves dealt with one topic and one topic alone: the cult of this incomprehensible being. — His curiosity intensified, the closer he came to meeting Muller. — What did he look like? — Who was he?

  XLIV

  On torturing flowers · Ohisver Muller is playing in the children's room · The jewellery case · Rubber larvae made of human skin · The orang-utan again!

  Another chamber:

  Glass cases containing silver models of strange instruments and tools that Brok is unable to understand. — Were they perhaps sophisticated instruments of torture, constructed and brought together for the purpose of unimaginable torment? It seems to Brok that some of the shapes suggest they are meant for torturing animals, birds and insects, rather than human beings.

  On the table stands a blackened lilac bouquet in a container filled with yellow foul-smelling liquid. Next to it is a parchment-bound volume: