Page:Strange Tales Of Mystery And Terror Volume 01 Number 03 (1932-01) (Pages removed).djvu/112

402 pile. When they had managed to get their necks and shoulders clear, they discovered that the commotion was being made by certain people who differed from their late hosts, the Bhlemphroims, in that they possessed rudimentary heads.

These people were some of the Ydheems, on one of whose towns the avalanche had descended. Roofs and towers were beginning to emerge from the mass of boulders and puff-balls; and just in front of the Hyperboreans there was a large temple-like edifice from whose blocked-up door a multitude of the Ydheems had now tunneled their way. At sight of Eibon and Morghi they suspended their labors; and the sorcerer, who had freed himself and had made sure that all his bones and members were intact, now took the opportunity to address them.

“Harken!” the said with great importance. “I have come to bring you a message from the god Hziulquoigmnzhah. I have borne it faithfully on ways beset with many hazards and perils. In the god’s own divine language, it runs thus: ‘Iqhui dlosh okhqlongh.’”

Since he spoke in the dialect of the Bhlemphroims, which differed somewhat from their own, it is doubtful if the Ydheems altogether understood the first part of his utterance. But Hziulquoigmnzhah was their tutelary deity; and they knew the language of the gods. At the words: “Ighui dlosh odhglonqh,” there was a most remarkable resumption and increase of activity, a ceaseless running to and fro on the part of the Ydheems, a shouting of guttural orders, and a recrudescence of new heads and limbs from the avalanche.

Those who had issued from the temple re-entered it, and came out once more carrying a huge image of Hziulquoigmnzhah, some smaller icons of lesser though allied deities, and a very ancient-looking idol which both Eibon and Morghi recognized as having a resemblance to Zhothaqquah. Others of the Ydheems brought their household goods and furniture forth from the dwellings, and, signing the Hyperboreans to accompany them, the whole populace began to evacuate the town.

IBON and Morghi were much mystified. And it was not until a new town had been built on the fungus-wooded plain at the distance of a full day’s march, and they themselves had been installed among the priests of the new temple, that they learned the reason of it all and the meaning of: “Iqhui dlosh odhqlonqh.” These words meant merely: “Be on your way;” and the god had addressed them to Eibon as a dismissal. But the coincidental coming of the avalanche and of Eibon and Morghi with this purported message from the god, had been taken by the Ydheems as a divine injunction to remove themselves and their goods from their present location. Thus the wholesale exodus of people with their idols and domestic belongings.

The new town was called Ghlomph, after the one that the avalanche had buried. Here, for the remainder of their days, Eibon and Morghi were held in much honor; and their coming with the message, “Ighui dlosh odhqlonqh,” was deemed a fortunate thing, since there were no more avalanches to threaten the security of Ghlomph in its new situation remote from the mountains.

The Hyperboreans shared the increment of civic affluence and wellbeing resultant from this security. There was no national mother among the Ydheems, who propagated themselves in a far more general manner than the