For now, there's stern work ahead!"
The Legionaries assumed their posts, ready for whatever attack might
come. They still moved like men in a trance. Whether they could quite
even realize the true character of Jannati Shahr seemed doubtful. The
Inca's room of gold stunned Pizarro and his men. How much more, then,
must a whole city of gold numb any concrete thought?
Down, still down sank _Nissr_, now beginning to circle in broad,
descending spirals, seeking where she might land. The roar of the
propellers lessened; and at the same time, the increasing hum of the
helicopters made itself heard, counterbalancing the loss of lifting
power of the planes, yet gradually letting the air-liner sink. Came,
too, a sighing hiss of the air-intakes as the vacuum-floats filled.
High noon was now at hand. The sun burned, a copper ball, in the very
forehead of a turquoise sky. A light breeze, lazying over the plain,
stirred the fronded tufts of the date-palms' thick plantations.
Beyond a massy grove, stretching for nearly two miles out from
the northernmost gate of the city, a grassy level quite like a
parade-ground invited the liner to rest.
As she sank still lower, the Master's glass again picked up the city
wall and ran along it.
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