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had seen hitherto, with larger heads and smaller bodies, and much more
elaborately wrapped about. And after evading them for some time I fell
into a crevasse, cut my head rather badly, and displaced my patella, and,
finding crawling very painful, decided to surrender--if they would still
permit me to do so. This they did, and, perceiving my helpless condition,
carried me with them again into the moon. And of Bedford I have heard or
seen nothing more, nor, so far as I can gather, any Selenite. Either the
night overtook him in the crater, or else, which is more probable, he
found the sphere, and, desiring to steal a march upon me, made off with
it--only, I fear, to find it uncontrollable, and to meet a more lingering
fate in outer space."
And with that Cavor dismisses me and goes on to more interesting topics. I
dislike the idea of seeming to use my position as his editor to deflect
his story in my own interest, but I am obliged to protest here against the
turn he gives these occurrences. He said nothing about that gasping
message on the blood-stained paper in which he told, or attempted to tell,
a very different story. The dignified self-surrender is an altogether new
view of the affair that has come to him, I must insist, since he began to
feel secure among the lunar people; and as for the "stealing a march"
conception, I am quite willing to let the reader decide between us on what
he has before him. I know I am not a model man--I have made no pretence
to be. But am I that?
However, that is the sum of my wrongs. From this point I can edit Cavor
with an untroubled mind, for he mentions me no more.
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