The War of the Worlds: Chapter 26 Der Krieg der Welten: Kapitel 26 La guerra de los mundos: capítulo 26 La guerra dei mondi: capitolo 26 Dünyalar Savaşı: Bölüm 26

Chapter Nine Wreckage

And now comes the strangest thing in my story. Yet, perhaps, it is not altogether strange. I remember, clearly and coldly and vividly, all that I did that day until the time that I stood weeping and praising God upon the summit of Primrose Hill. And then I forget.

Of the next three days I know nothing. I have learned since that, so far from my being the first discoverer of the Martian overthrow, several such wanderers as myself had already discovered this on the previous night. One man—the first—had gone to St. Martin’s-le-Grand, and, while I sheltered in the cabmen’s hut, had contrived to telegraph to Paris. Thence the joyful news had flashed all over the world; a thousand cities, chilled by ghastly apprehensions, suddenly flashed into frantic illuminations; they knew of it in Dublin, Edinburgh, Manchester, Birmingham, at the time when I stood upon the verge of the pit. Already men, weeping with joy, as I have heard, shouting and staying their work to shake hands and shout, were making up trains, even as near as Crewe, to descend upon London. The church bells that had ceased a fortnight since suddenly caught the news, until all England was bell-ringing. Men on cycles, lean-faced, unkempt, scorched along every country lane shouting of unhoped deliverance, shouting to gaunt, staring figures of despair. And for the food! Across the Channel, across the Irish Sea, across the Atlantic, corn, bread, and meat were tearing to our relief. All the shipping in the world seemed going Londonward in those days. Todos os navios do mundo pareciam ir para Londres naquela época. But of all this I have no memory. Mas de tudo isso não tenho memória. I drifted—a demented man. Eu me perdi - um homem demente. I found myself in a house of kindly people, who had found me on the third day wandering, weeping, and raving through the streets of St. Encontrei-me em uma casa de pessoas gentis, que me encontraram no terceiro dia vagando, chorando e delirando pelas ruas de St. John’s Wood. John's Wood. They have told me since that I was singing some insane doggerel about “The Last Man Left Alive! Eles me contaram desde então que eu estava cantando algum doggerel insano sobre “The Last Man Left Alive! Hurrah! Viva! The Last Man Left Alive!” Troubled as they were with their own affairs, these people, whose name, much as I would like to express my gratitude to them, I may not even give here, nevertheless cumbered themselves with me, sheltered me, and protected me from myself. O último homem que sobrou! ” Perturbados como estavam com seus próprios assuntos, essas pessoas, cujo nome, por mais que eu gostaria de expressar minha gratidão a eles, eu nem posso dar aqui, no entanto, sobrecarregaram-se comigo, me protegeram e me protegeram de mim mesmo. Apparently they had learned something of my story from me during the days of my lapse. Aparentemente, eles aprenderam algo sobre minha história comigo durante os dias de meu lapso.

Very gently, when my mind was assured again, did they break to me what they had learned of the fate of Leatherhead. Muito gentilmente, quando minha mente estava novamente tranquila, eles me contaram o que haviam descoberto sobre o destino de Leatherhead. Two days after I was imprisoned it had been destroyed, with every soul in it, by a Martian. Dois dias depois que fui preso, ele foi destruído, com todas as almas nele, por um marciano. He had swept it out of existence, as it seemed, without any provocation, as a boy might crush an ant hill, in the mere wantonness of power. Ele o havia varrido da existência, ao que parecia, sem qualquer provocação, como um menino esmaga um formigueiro, na mera libertinagem do poder.

I was a lonely man, and they were very kind to me. Eu era um homem solitário e eles foram muito gentis comigo. I was a lonely man and a sad one, and they bore with me. Eu era um homem solitário e triste, e eles me aborreciam. I remained with them four days after my recovery. Fiquei com eles quatro dias após minha recuperação. All that time I felt a vague, a growing craving to look once more on whatever remained of the little life that seemed so happy and bright in my past. Todo aquele tempo eu senti uma vaga e crescente ânsia de olhar mais uma vez para o que restava da pequena vida que parecia tão feliz e brilhante em meu passado. It was a mere hopeless desire to feast upon my misery. Era um mero desejo desesperado de festejar com minha miséria. They dissuaded me. Eles me dissuadiram. They did all they could to divert me from this morbidity. Eles fizeram tudo o que puderam para me desviar dessa morbidez. But at last I could resist the impulse no longer, and, promising faithfully to return to them, and parting, as I will confess, from these four-day friends with tears, I went out again into the streets that had lately been so dark and strange and empty. Mas finalmente não pude resistir mais ao impulso e, prometendo fielmente voltar a eles, e me separando, como devo confessar, desses amigos de quatro dias com lágrimas, saí novamente para as ruas que ultimamente estavam tão escuras e estranho e vazio.

Already they were busy with returning people; in places even there were shops open, and I saw a drinking fountain running water. Eles já estavam ocupados com o retorno de pessoas; em alguns lugares até havia lojas abertas, e eu vi um bebedouro de água corrente.

I remember how mockingly bright the day seemed as I went back on my melancholy pilgrimage to the little house at Woking, how busy the streets and vivid the moving life about me. So many people were abroad everywhere, busied in a thousand activities, that it seemed incredible that any great proportion of the population could have been slain. Tantas pessoas estavam em todos os lugares, ocupadas em mil atividades, que parecia incrível que qualquer grande proporção da população pudesse ter sido morta. But then I noticed how yellow were the skins of the people I met, how shaggy the hair of the men, how large and bright their eyes, and that every other man still wore his dirty rags. Mas então percebi como as peles das pessoas que conheci eram amarelas, como eram desgrenhados os cabelos dos homens, como seus olhos eram grandes e brilhantes e que todos os outros homens ainda usavam seus trapos sujos. Their faces seemed all with one of two expressions—a leaping exultation and energy or a grim resolution. Seus rostos pareciam todos com uma de duas expressões - uma exultação e energia saltitantes ou uma resolução sombria. Save for the expression of the faces, London seemed a city of tramps. Exceto pela expressão dos rostos, Londres parecia uma cidade de vagabundos. The vestries were indiscriminately distributing bread sent us by the French government. As sacristias distribuíam indiscriminadamente pão enviado pelo governo francês. The ribs of the few horses showed dismally. As costelas dos poucos cavalos mostraram-se tristemente. Haggard special constables with white badges stood at the corners of every street. Policiais especiais abatidos com emblemas brancos ficavam nas esquinas de todas as ruas. I saw little of the mischief wrought by the Martians until I reached Wellington Street, and there I saw the red weed clambering over the buttresses of Waterloo Bridge. Quase não vi as travessuras dos marcianos até chegar à Wellington Street e lá vi a erva daninha escalando os contrafortes da ponte Waterloo.

At the corner of the bridge, too, I saw one of the common contrasts of that grotesque time—a sheet of paper flaunting against a thicket of the red weed, transfixed by a stick that kept it in place. Na esquina da ponte, também, vi um dos contrastes comuns daquela época grotesca - uma folha de papel se projetando contra um matagal de erva daninha vermelha, paralisada por um pedaço de pau que a mantinha no lugar. It was the placard of the first newspaper to resume publication—the Daily Mail. Foi o cartaz do primeiro jornal a retomar a publicação - o Daily Mail. I bought a copy for a blackened shilling I found in my pocket. Comprei uma cópia por um xelim enegrecido que encontrei no bolso. Most of it was in blank, but the solitary compositor who did the thing had amused himself by making a grotesque scheme of advertisement stereo on the back page. A maior parte estava em branco, mas o compositor solitário que fez a coisa se divertiu fazendo um esquema grotesco de som de propaganda na última página. The matter he printed was emotional; the news organisation had not as yet found its way back. O assunto que ele imprimiu foi emocional; a organização de notícias ainda não havia encontrado seu caminho de volta. I learned nothing fresh except that already in one week the examination of the Martian mechanisms had yielded astonishing results. Não aprendi nada de novo, exceto que já em uma semana o exame dos mecanismos marcianos produziu resultados surpreendentes. Among other things, the article assured me what I did not believe at the time, that the “Secret of Flying,” was discovered. Entre outras coisas, o artigo me garantiu o que eu não acreditava na época, que o “Segredo de Voar” foi descoberto. At Waterloo I found the free trains that were taking people to their homes. Em Waterloo, encontrei os trens gratuitos que levavam as pessoas para suas casas. The first rush was already over. A primeira corrida já havia acabado. There were few people in the train, and I was in no mood for casual conversation. Havia poucas pessoas no trem e eu não estava com humor para uma conversa casual. I got a compartment to myself, and sat with folded arms, looking greyly at the sunlit devastation that flowed past the windows. Peguei um compartimento só para mim e sentei-me com os braços cruzados, olhando acinzentada para a devastação iluminada pelo sol que passava pelas janelas. And just outside the terminus the train jolted over temporary rails, and on either side of the railway the houses were blackened ruins. E, do lado de fora do terminal, o trem sacolejou sobre trilhos temporários, e em ambos os lados da ferrovia as casas eram ruínas enegrecidas. To Clapham Junction the face of London was grimy with powder of the Black Smoke, in spite of two days of thunderstorms and rain, and at Clapham Junction the line had been wrecked again; there were hundreds of out-of-work clerks and shopmen working side by side with the customary navvies, and we were jolted over a hasty relaying.

All down the line from there the aspect of the country was gaunt and unfamiliar; Wimbledon particularly had suffered. De lá para cá, o aspecto do país era magro e desconhecido; Particularmente, Wimbledon havia sofrido. Walton, by virtue of its unburned pine woods, seemed the least hurt of any place along the line. Walton, em virtude de seus pinheiros não queimados, parecia o menos ferido de qualquer lugar ao longo da linha. The Wandle, the Mole, every little stream, was a heaped mass of red weed, in appearance between butcher’s meat and pickled cabbage. O Wandle, o Mole, cada pequeno riacho, era uma massa amontoada de erva daninha vermelha, na aparência entre carne de açougue e repolho em conserva. The Surrey pine woods were too dry, however, for the festoons of the red climber. Os pinhais de Surrey estavam secos demais para as festões do alpinista vermelho. Beyond Wimbledon, within sight of the line, in certain nursery grounds, were the heaped masses of earth about the sixth cylinder. Além de Wimbledon, à vista da linha, em certos berçários, estavam as massas amontoadas de terra em torno do sexto cilindro. A number of people were standing about it, and some sappers were busy in the midst of it. Over it flaunted a Union Jack, flapping cheerfully in the morning breeze. The nursery grounds were everywhere crimson with the weed, a wide expanse of livid colour cut with purple shadows, and very painful to the eye. One’s gaze went with infinite relief from the scorched greys and sullen reds of the foreground to the blue-green softness of the eastward hills.

The line on the London side of Woking station was still undergoing repair, so I descended at Byfleet station and took the road to Maybury, past the place where I and the artilleryman had talked to the hussars, and on by the spot where the Martian had appeared to me in the thunderstorm. Here, moved by curiosity, I turned aside to find, among a tangle of red fronds, the warped and broken dog cart with the whitened bones of the horse scattered and gnawed. For a time I stood regarding these vestiges….

Then I returned through the pine wood, neck-high with red weed here and there, to find the landlord of the Spotted Dog had already found burial, and so came home past the College Arms. A man standing at an open cottage door greeted me by name as I passed.

I looked at my house with a quick flash of hope that faded immediately. The door had been forced; it was unfast and was opening slowly as I approached.

It slammed again. The curtains of my study fluttered out of the open window from which I and the artilleryman had watched the dawn. No one had closed it since. The smashed bushes were just as I had left them nearly four weeks ago. I stumbled into the hall, and the house felt empty. The stair carpet was ruffled and discoloured where I had crouched, soaked to the skin from the thunderstorm the night of the catastrophe. Our muddy footsteps I saw still went up the stairs.

I followed them to my study, and found lying on my writing-table still, with the selenite paper weight upon it, the sheet of work I had left on the afternoon of the opening of the cylinder. For a space I stood reading over my abandoned arguments. It was a paper on the probable development of Moral Ideas with the development of the civilising process; and the last sentence was the opening of a prophecy: “In about two hundred years,” I had written, “we may expect——” The sentence ended abruptly. I remembered my inability to fix my mind that morning, scarcely a month gone by, and how I had broken off to get my Daily Chronicle from the newsboy. I remembered how I went down to the garden gate as he came along, and how I had listened to his odd story of “Men from Mars.”

I came down and went into the dining room. There were the mutton and the bread, both far gone now in decay, and a beer bottle overturned, just as I and the artilleryman had left them. My home was desolate. I perceived the folly of the faint hope I had cherished so long. And then a strange thing occurred. “It is no use,” said a voice. “The house is deserted. No one has been here these ten days. Do not stay here to torment yourself. No one escaped but you.”

I was startled. Had I spoken my thought aloud? I turned, and the French window was open behind me. I made a step to it, and stood looking out.

And there, amazed and afraid, even as I stood amazed and afraid, were my cousin and my wife—my wife white and tearless. She gave a faint cry.

“I came,” she said. “I knew—knew——”

She put her hand to her throat—swayed. I made a step forward, and caught her in my arms.