Captain Future 12 - Planets in Peril (Fall 1942) by Edmond Hamilton Read Free Book Online

front of its straight side was a big, crowded plaza, from which rose the giant stone figure of a statue in heroic size. As their craft slanted down past the statue, Curt noticed that the figure represented a man whose strong, idealized face was turned boldly up toward the heavens.
    "What is that monument?" he asked the girl, and the answer she gave him over her shoulder startled him.
    "It is a statue of Kaffr — of our great racial hero."
    Curt Newton felt a sinking sensation. More and more, the audacity of this proposed impersonation unnerved him. How could he manage to pass himself off as that heroic figure who had died long ages ago?
    Shiri was landing near a small entrance in the rear or curved side of the Hall of Suns. There had been great crowds of Tarasts on the front plaza, which it was evidently her purpose to avoid.
    "This way," she breathed, leading the way out of the flyer.
    "There is a passage that leads directly to the stage of the Council Room."
    Captain Future and his comrades followed her into the building. Curt could not help noticing that this mastodonic structure was ancient and crumbling, like everything else he had so far seen in the city.
    They followed corridors lighted by luminous bands along the walls. They came finally to a door which Shiri opened for a few inches, after making a warning sign.
    Curt heard a man's voice, powerful and clear, yet echoing as though through great spaces to his ears. Shiri abruptly grasped Future's hand.
    "It is Vostol speaking now to the Council!” she whispered. "He is challenging my brother. Listen!"
    Curt bent and peered through the crack of the open door. He found himself looking out into an interior amphitheater of colossal size. Tall windows admitted the dying red light, to illuminate rising tiers of thousands upon thousands of white marble seats.
    But most of those seats were empty. In the great, dusty room, only a few hundred Tarast men and women sat in the first tiers. So much had the once-mighty Council of Suns shrunken as its cosmic empire faded.
    The tiers of seats faced a broad stage directly in front of the door through which Curt looked. Upon this stage were three Tarast men. One was an aged chairman who sat with his back to Captain Future. Another of the three was Gerdek, who stood a little to one side, his handsome face tense and almost desperate in expression.
    The third man, speaking to the silent hundreds of the Council, held the center of the stage. Vostol, as Shiri had named the speaker, was a young, stalwart man whose voice rang out into the vast, shadowy hall with an accent of earnest conviction.
    "I say again that Gerdek and his friends seek to dupe you like children!" Vostol was declaring ringingly. "They tell you a fable of the approaching return of Kaffr, only to ply you to their will. Can a man dead these millions of years come back to life?"
    Gerdek spoke in defiant interruption.
    "An ordinary man could not. But Kaffr had powers beyond those of ordinary men. All our legends tell us that."
    There was a low murmur of agreement from the Council. It was expressive of age-old reverence for the great hero of the Tarasts.
     
    BUT Vostol voiced the incredulity that was on the faces of others.
    "Kaffr is a great legend, an heroic legend, but only a legend now," he declared. "I revere his memory. It is Gerdek and his fellow-conspirators who desecrate that memory by their lying assertions that Kaffr is on the eve of returning to our midst."
    "He will return," Gerdek insisted desperately. "All the ancient prophecies predict that when his people need him most, Kaffr will come back to lead them again. And we have found old records of predictions that make it certain the time of his coming is near at hand."
    "But when will he come?" Vostol cried. "If you have proofs that he will come, you must be able to tell us the exact time at which mighty Kaffr will return from the dead."
    Gerdek looked trapped and desperate in the face of that demand. The members of