Night followed
day; and day night again. None of the crews realised the fact.
The men were caught in the toils of a labour ceaseless and eternal.
Never would it end, just as never had it begun. Always were they to
handle piles, steam hammers and the implements of their trade,
menaced by a jam on the point of breaking, wet by a swollen and
angry flood, over-arched by a clear calm sky or by the twinkling
peaceful stars. Long since had they ceased to reckon with the
results of what they did, the consequences either to themselves or
to the jam. Mechanically they performed their labour. Perhaps the
logs would kill them. Perhaps these long, black, dripping piles
they drove were having some effect on the situation. Neither
possibility mattered.
Then all at once, as though a faucet had been turned off, the floods
slackened.
"They've opened the channel," said Orde dully. His voice sounded to
himself very far away. Suddenly the external world, too, seemed
removed to a distance, far from his centre of consciousness. He
felt himself moving in strange and distorted surroundings; he heard
himself repeating to each of a number of wavering, gigantic figures
the talismanic words that had accomplished the dissolution of the
earth for himself: "They've opened the channel.
Pages:
423
424
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441
442
443
444
445
446
447