Detective and mystery stories, English; Horror tales, English
"I have said that I was soaring in circles. It struck me suddenly that
I would do well to take a wider sweep and open up a new airtract. If
the hunter entered an earth-jungle he would drive through it if he
wished to find his game. My reasoning had led me to believe that the
air-jungle which I had imagined lay somewhere over Wiltshire. This
should be to the south and west of me. I took my bearings from the
sun, for the compass was hopeless and no trace of earth was to be
seen--nothing but the distant, silver cloud-plain. However, I got my
direction as best I might and kept her head straight to the mark. I
reckoned that my petrol supply would not last for more than another
hour or so, but I could afford to use it to the last drop, since a
single magnificent vol-plane could at any time take me to the earth.
"Suddenly I was aware of something new. The air in front of me had
lost its crystal clearness. It was full of long, ragged wisps of
something which I can only compare to very fine cigarette smoke. It
hung about in wreaths and coils, turning and twisting slowly in the
sunlight. As the monoplane shot through it, I was aware of a faint
taste of oil upon my lips, and there was a greasy scum upon the
woodwork of the machine. Some infinitely fine organic matter appeared
to be suspended in the atmosphere. There was no life there. It was
inchoate and diffuse, extending for many square acres and then fringing
off into the void. No, it was not life. But might it not be the
remains of life? Above all, might it not be the food of life, of
monstrous life, even as the humble grease of the ocean is the food for
the mighty whale? The thought was in my mind when my eyes looked
upwards and I saw the most wonderful vision that ever man has seen.
Can I hope to convey it to you even as I saw it myself last Thursday?
"Conceive a jelly-fish such as sails in our summer seas, bell-shaped
and of enormous size--far larger, I should judge, than the dome of St.
Paul's. It was of a light pink colour veined with a delicate green,
but the whole huge fabric so tenuous that it was but a fairy outline
against the dark blue sky. It pulsated with a delicate and regular
rhythm. From it there depended two long, drooping, green tentacles,
which swayed slowly backwards and forwards. This gorgeous vision
passed gently with noiseless dignity over my head, as light and fragile
as a soap-bubble, and drifted upon its stately way.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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