I am afraid that my lips curled to the sneer that was in my heart. What a petty soul was hers! Even in her humiliation and her penitence she could see no beauty and no happiness greater than wealth and power. She thought that she was changed, but I knew that Sanoma Tora never could change.
“Forgive me, Tan Hadron,” she cried. “Come back to me, for I love you. Now I know that I love you.”
“Your love has come too late, Sanoma Tora,” I said.
“You love another?” she asked.
“Yes,” I replied.
“The Jeddara of some of the strange countries you have been through?” she asked.
“A slave girl,” I replied.
Her eyes went wide in incredulity. She could not conceive that one might prefer a slave girl to the daughter of Tor Hatan. “Impossible,” she said.
“It is true, though,” I assured her; “a little slave girl is more desirable to Tan Hadron of Hastor than is Sanoma Tora, the daughter of Tor Hatan,” and with that I turned my back upon her and faced Phao. “Good-bye, dear friend,” I said. “Doubtless we shall never meet again, but I shall see to it that you have a good home in Hastor. I shall speak to the Warlord before I leave and have him send you directly to my mother.”
She laid her hand upon my shoulder. “Let me go with you, Tan Hadron,” she said, “for perhaps while you are searching for Tavia you will pass near Jhama.”
I understood instantly what she meant, and I reproached myself for having even temporarily forgotten Nur An. “You shall come with me, Phao,” I said, “and my first duty shall be to return to Jhama and rescue Nur An from poor old Phor Tak.”
Without another glance at Sanoma Tora I led Phao from the cabin, and after a few parting words with the Warlord we boarded my new ship and with friendly farewells in our ears headed west towards Jhama.
Being no longer protected by the invisibility compound of Phor Tak, or the disintegrating ray-resisting paint of Jahar, we were forced to keep a sharp lookout for enemy ships, of which I had little fear if we sighted them in time, for I knew that I could outdistance any of them.
I set the destination control compass upon Jhama and opened the throttle wide; the swift Barsoomian night had fallen; the only sound was the rush of thin air along our sides which drowned out the quiet purring of our motor.
For the first time since I had found her again in the quarters of the Jeddara at Jahar, I had an opportunity to talk with Phao, and the first thing I asked her was for an explanation of the abandonment of the Jhama after Tul Axtar had grounded Tavia and me in U-Gor.
“It was an accident,” she said, “that threw Tul Axtar into a great fit of rage. We were headed for Jahar when he sighted one of his own ships, which took us aboard as soon as they discovered the identity of the Jeddak. It was night, and in the confusion of boarding the Jaharian warship Tul Axtar momentarily forgot the Jhama, which must have drifted away from the larger craft the moment that we left her. They cruised about searching for her for awhile, but at last they had to give it up and the ship proceeded towards Jahar.”
The miracle of the presence of the Jhama at the top of the peak, where we had so providentially found it in time to escape from the hunting men of U-Gor, was now no longer a miracle. The prevailing winds in this part of Barsoom are from the north-west at this time of year. The Jhama had merely drifted with the wind and chanced to lodge upon the highest peak of the range.
Phao also told me why Tul Axtar had originally abducted Sanoma Tora from Helium. He had had his secret agents at Helium for some time previous and they had reported to him that the best way to lure the fleet of Helium to Jahar was to abduct a woman of some noble family. He had instructed them to select a beautiful one, and so they had decided upon the daughter of Tor Hatan.
“But how did they expect to lure the fleet of Helium to Jahar if they left no clue as to the identity of the abductors of Sanoma Tora?” I asked.
“They left no clue at the time because Tul Axtar was not ready to receive the attack of Helium,” explained Phao; “but he had already sent his agents word to drop a hint as to the whereabouts of Sanoma Tora when John Carter learned through other sources the identity of her abductors.”
“So it all worked out the way Tul Axtar had planned,” I said, “except the finish.”
We passed the hours with brief snatches of conversation and long silences, each occupied with our own thoughts—Phao’s doubtless a mixture of hope and fear, but there was little room for hope in mine. The only pleasant prospects that lay before me lay in rescuing Nur An and reuniting him and Phao. After that I would take them to any country to which they wished to go and then return to the vicinity of Jahar and prosecute my hopeless search.
“I heard what you said to Sanoma Tora in the cabin of the flagship,” said Phao after a long silence, “and I was glad.”
“I said a number of things,” I reminded her; “to which do you refer?”
“You said that you loved Tavia,” she replied.
“I said nothing of the kind,” I rejoined rather shortly, for I almost loathed that word.
“But you did,” she insisted. “You said that you loved a little slave girl and I know that you love Tavia. I have seen it in your eyes.”
“You have seen nothing of the kind. Because you are in love, you think that everyone must be.”
She laughed. “You love her and she loves you.”
“We are only friends—very good friends,” I insisted, “and furthermore I know that Tavia does not love me.”
“How do you know?”
“Let us not speak of it any more,” I said, but though I did not speak of it, I thought about it. I recalled that I had told Sanoma Tora that I loved a little slave girl and I knew that I had had Tavia in my mind at the time, but I thought that I had said it more to wound Sanoma Tora than for any other purpose. I tried to analyse my own feelings, but at last I gave it up as a foolish thing to do. Of course I did not love Tavia; I loved no one; love was not for me—Sanoma Tora had killed it within my breast, and I was equally sure that Tavia did not love me; if she had, she would have shown it, and I was quite sure that she had never demonstrated any other feeling for me than the finest of comradeship. We were just what she had said we were—comrades in arms, and nothing else.
It was still dark when I saw the gleaming white palace of Phor Tak shining softly in the moonlight far below us. Late as it was, there were lights in some of the rooms. I had hoped that all would be asleep, for my plans depended upon my ability to enter the palace secretly. I knew that Phor Tak never kept any watch at night, feeling that none was needed in such an isolated spot.
Silently I dropped the flier until it rested upon the roof of the building where Nur An and I had first landed, for I knew that there I would find a passage to the palace below.
“Wait here at the controls, Phao,” I whispered. “Nur An and I may have to come away in a hurry and you must be ready.”
She nodded her head understandingly, and a moment later I had slipped quietly to the roof and was approaching the opening that led down into the interior.
As I paused at the top of the spiral ramp I felt quickly for my weapons to see that each was in its place. John Carter had fitted me out anew. Once more I stood in the leather and metal of Helium, with a full complement of weapons such as belong to a fighting man of Barsoom. My long sword was of the best steel, for it was one of John Carter’s own. Besides this, I carried a short sword and a dagger, and once again a heavy radium pistol hung at my hip. I loosened the latter in its holster as I started down the spiral ramp.
As I approached the bottom I heard a voice. It was coming from the direction of Phor Tak’s laboratory, the door of which opened upon the corridor at the bottom of the ramp. I crept slowly downward. The door leading to the laboratory was closed. Two men were conversing. I could recognize the thin, high voice of Phor Tak; the other voice was not that of Nur An; yet it was strangely familiar.
“—riches beyond your dream,” I heard the
second man say.
“I do not need riches,” crackled Phor Tak. “Heigh-oo! Presently I shall own all the riches in the world.”
“You will need help,” I could hear the other man say in a pleading tone. “I can give you help; you shall have every ship of my great fleet.”
That remark brought me upstanding—“every ship of my great fleet!” It could not be possible, and yet——
Gently I tried the door. To my surprise it swung open, revealing the interior of the room. Beneath a bright light stood Tul Axtar. Fifty feet from him Phor Tak was standing behind a bench upon which was mounted a disintegrating-ray rifle, aimed full at Tul Axtar.
Where was Tavia? Where was Nur An? Perhaps this man alone knew where Tavia was, and Phor Tak was about to destroy him. With a cry of warning I leaped into the room. Tul Axtar and Phor Tak looked at me quickly, surprise large upon their countenances.
“Heigh-oo!” screamed the old inventor. “So you have come back! Knave! Ingrate! Traitor! But you have come back only to die.”
“Wait,” I cried, raising my hand. “Let me speak.”
“Silence!” screamed Phor Tak. “You shall see Tul Axtar die. I hated to kill him without someone to see—someone to witness his death agony. I shall have my revenge on him first and then on you.”
“Stop!” I cried. His finger was already hovering over the button that would snatch Tul Axtar into oblivion, perhaps with the secret of the whereabouts of Tavia.
I drew my pistol. Phor Tak made a sudden motion with his hands and disappeared. He vanished as though turned to thin air by his own disintegrating rays, but I knew what had happened. I knew that he had thrown a mantle of invisibility around himself and I fired at the spot where he had last been visible.
At the same instant the floor opened beneath me and I shot into utter darkness.
I felt myself hurtling along a smooth surface which gradually became horizontal, and an instant later I shot into a dimly lighted apartment, which I knew must be located in the pits beneath the palace.
I had clung to my pistol as I fell, and now, as I arose to my feet, I thrust it back into its holster; at least I was not unarmed.
The dim light in the apartment, which was little better than no light at all, I discovered, came from a ventilator in the ceiling, and that except for the shaft that had conducted me to the cell, there was no other opening in the wall or ceiling or floor. The ventilator was about two feet in diameter and led straight up from the centre of the ceiling to the roof of the building, several levels above. The lower end of the shaft was about two feet above my finger-tips when I extended them high above my head. This avenue of escape, then, was useless, but, alas, how tantalizing. It was maddening to see daylight and an open avenue to the outer world just above me and be unable to reach it. I was glad that the sun had risen, throwing its quick light over the scene, for had I fallen here in utter darkness my plight would have seemed infinitely worse than now, and my first ancestor knew that it was bad enough. I turned my attention now to the chute through which I had descended and found that I could ascend it quite a little distance, but presently it turned steeply upward and its smoothly polished walls were unscalable.
I returned to the pits. I must escape; but now, as my eyes became accustomed to the dim light, I saw strewn about the floor that which snatched away my last hope and filled me with horror. Everywhere upon the stone flagging were heaps and mounds of human bones picked clean by gnawing rats. I shuddered as I contemplated the coming of night. How long before my bones, too, would be numbered among the rest?
The thought made me frantic, not for myself but for Tavia. I could not die. I must not die. I must live until I had found her.
Hastily I circled the room, searching for some clue to hope, but I found only rough-hewn stone set in soft mortar.
Soft mortar! With the realization, hope dawned anew. If I could remove a few of these blocks and pile them one on top of the other, I might easily reach the shaft that terminated in the ceiling above my head. Drawing my dagger I fell to work, scraping and scratching at the mortar about one of the stones in the nearest wall. It seemed slow work, but in reality I had loosened the stone in an incredibly short time. The mortar was poor stuff and crumbled away easily. As I drew the block out my first plan faded in the light of what I saw in front of me. Beyond the opening, and from somewhere above, daylight was filtering down.
I know that if I could remove three more of those stones before I was detected I could worm my body through the opening into the corridor beyond, and you may well believe that I worked rapidly.
One by one the blocks were loosened and removed and it was with a feeling of exultation that I slipped through into the corridor. Above me rose a spiral ramp. Where it led I did not know, but at least it led out of the pits. Cautiously, and yet without any hesitation, I ascended. I must try to reach the laboratory before Phor Tak had slain Tul Axtar. This time I would make sure of the old inventor before I entered the room, and I prayed to all my ancestors that I should be in time.
Doors, leading from the ramp to various levels of the palace, were all locked and I was forced to ascend to the roof. As it chanced, the wing upon which I found myself was more or less detached, so that at first glance I could see no way whereby I could make my way from it to any of the adjoining roofs.
As I walked around the edge of the building hurriedly, looking for some means of descent to the roof below, I saw something one level below me that instantly charged my attention. It was a man’s leg protruding from a window, as though he had thrown one limb across the sill. A moment later I saw an arm emerge, and the top of a man’s head and his shoulders were visible as he leaned out. He reached down and up, and I saw something appear directly beneath him that had not been there before, and at the same instant I caught a glimpse of a girl, lying a few feet further down, and then I saw the man slide over the sill quickly and drop down and disappear, and all that lay below me was the flagging of a courtyard.
But in that brief instant I knew what I had seen. I had seen Tul Axtar raise the hatch of the Jhama. I had seen Tavia lying bound upon the floor of the ship beneath the hatch. I had seen Tul Axtar enter the interior of the craft and close the hatch above his head.
It takes a long while to tell it when compared with the time in which it actually transpired; nor was I so long in acting as I have been in telling.
As the hatch closed, I leaped.
chapter XVII
I FIND A PRINCESS
IT WOULD BE AS UNREASONABLE to aver that I fully visualized the outcome of my act as I leaped out into space with nothing visible between me and the flagstones of the courtyard forty feet below as it would be to assume that I acted solely upon unreasoning impulse. There are emergencies in which the mind functions with inconceivable celerity. Perceptions are received, judgments arrived at and reason operates to a definite conclusion all so swiftly that three acts appear simultaneous. Thus must have been the process in this instance.
I knew where the narrow walkway upon the upper deck of the Jhama must lie in the seemingly empty space below me, for I had jumped almost the instant that the hatch had closed. Of course I know now, and I knew then, that it would have been a dangerous feat and difficult of achievement even had I been able to see the Jhama below me; yet as I look back upon it now there was nothing else that I could have done. It was my one, my last chance to save Tavia from a fate worse than death—it was perhaps my last opportunity ever to see her again. As I jumped then I should jump again under like conditions, even though I knew that I should miss the Jhama, for now as then I know that I should rather die than lose Tavia; although then I did not know why, while now I do.
But I did not miss. I landed squarely upon my feet upon the narrow walkway. The impact of my weight upon the upper deck of the craft must have been noticeable to Tul Axtar, for I could feel the Jhama drop a little beneath me. Doubtless he wondered what had happened, but I do not think that he guessed the truth. However, he did not raise the hatch
as I hoped he would, but instead he must have leaped to the controls at once, for almost immediately the Jhama rose swiftly at an acute angle, which made it difficult for me to cling to her, since her upper deck was not equipped with harness rings. By grasping the forward edge of the turret, however, I managed to hold on.
As Tul Axtar gained sufficient altitude and straightened out upon his course he opened the throttle wide, so that the wind rushing by me at terrific velocity seemed momentarily upon the point of carrying me from my precarious hold and hurtling me to the ground far below. Fortunately I am a strong man—none other could have survived that ordeal—yet how utterly helpless I was.
Had Tul Axtar guessed the truth he could have raised the after hatch and had me at his mercy, for though my pistol hung at my side I could not have released either hand to use it, but doubtless Tul Axtar did not know, or if he did he hoped that the high speed of the ship would dislodge whoever or whatever it might have been that he felt drop upon it.
I had hung there but a short time before I realized that eventually my hold must weaken and be torn loose. Something must be done to rectify my position. Tavia must be saved, and because I alone could save her, I must not die.
Straining every thew I dragged myself further forward until I lay with my chest upon the turret. Slowly, inch by inch, I wormed myself forward. The tubular sheeting of the periscope was just in front of me. If I could but reach that with one hand I might hope to attain greater safety. The wind was buffeting me, seeking to tear me away. I sought a better hold with my left forearm about the turret, and then I reached quickly forward with my right hand and my fingers closed about the sheathing.
After that it was not difficult to stretch a part of my harness about the front of the turret. Now I found that I could have one hand free, but until the ship stopped I could not hope to accomplish anything more.
What was transpiring beneath me? Could Tavia be safe even for a brief time in the power of Tul Axtar? The thought drove me frantic. The Jhama must be stopped, and then an inspiration came to me.
John Carter's 02 Chronicles of Mars Volume Two Page 79
