"Follow me," said the captain stiffly, for there were several guards in white and gold uniforms pacing to and fro on the battlement-like walls. He led the two adventurers through a door in the base of the dome. At first they were dazed by a brilliant light from above, and looking up they beheld a marvel of kaleidoscopic colors formed by a myriad of electric-lighted prisms sloping gradually from the floor to the apex of the dome.
Thorndyke could compare it to nothing but a stupendous diamond, the very heart of which the eye penetrated.
"Don't look at it now," advised Tradmos, in an undertone; "it was constructed to be seen from below, and to light the great rotunda."Mutely the captives obeyed. At every turn they were greeted with a new wonder. The captain now led them round a narrow balcony on the inside of the vast dome, and, looking over the railing down below, they saw a vast tessellated pavement made of polished stones of various and brilliant colors and so artistically arranged that, from where they stood, lifelike pictures of landscapes seemed to rise to meet the vision wherever the eye rested. Statues of white marble, gold and bronze were placed here and there, and, in squares of living green, fountains threw up streams of crystal water. Tradmos paused for them to look down and smiled at their evident admiration.
"How far is it down there?" Thorndyke ventured to ask.
"Over a thousand feet," replied Tradmos. "Look across opposite and you will see that there are fifty floors beneath us, and each floor has a balcony like this overlooking the court.""What is the sound that comes up from below?" asked the Englishman.
"It is the voices of the people and their footsteps on the stone.""What people?"
"Don't you see them? Your eyes are dazzled by the light; I ought to have warned you against looking up into the dome. The people are down there; do the views in the pavement not look a little blurred?""Yes."
"Well, if you will look more closely you will see that it is a multitude of people.""Great heavens!" exclaimed the Englishman, and he became deeply absorbed in the contemplation of the rarest sight he had ever seen. As he looked closely he noticed a black spot growing larger and nearer, and he glanced inquiringly at the captain.
"It is an elevator. There are a great many of them used in the palace, but none have happened to rise as high as this since we came. The one you see is coming for us." The next moment the strange vehicle was floating toward them. The captain opened the door and preceded the captives into the interior.
"The royal audience chamber," he said, carelessly, to the driver behind the glass of the adjoining compartment, and down they floated as lightly as a bubble--down past balcony after balcony, laden with moving throngs, until they alighted in a great conservatory.
Near them was a tall fountain the water of which was playing weird music on great bells of glass, some of which hung in the fountain's stream and others rose and fell, giving forth strange, submerged tones in the foaming basin.
"It is a new invention recently placed here by the king's son who is a musical genius," explained Tradmos. "You will be astonished at some of his inventions."He led them, as if to avoid the great crowds that they could now hear on all sides, down a long vista of palms, the branches of which met over their heads, to the wide door of the audience chamber. A party of men dressed in uniforms of white silk with gold and silver ornaments bowed before the captain and made way for him.
