Escape on Venus v-4

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

  "How is this slave working?" he asked the slave-driver, who was standing over us.

  "All right so far," said the man; "he is very strong. He can lift rocks easily that any two other slaves have to strain to lift."

  "Watch him," said Stalar, "and beat him until he screams for mercy if he shirks his work or gives you any trouble; for I can tell you that he is a trouble-maker." Then he walked away.

  "What has Stalar got against you?" asked the guard, after the chief slave-driver was out of hearing.

  "I haven't the slightest idea," I said, "unless it is that he thinks I am a Pangan."

  "Aren't you?" asked the guard.

  "No," I replied; but I was careful to keep on working diligently all the time, for fear the man was looking for an excuse for whipping me. I had decided that it was foolish to antagonize them up to a point where they would kill me; for there must always be the hope of escape and eventual reunion with Duare if she still lived.

  "Stalar's a mean one," said the guard.

  "Is he?" I asked. "He has never harmed me."

  "Wait," said the man; "he'll get you. I can tell by the way he spoke that he has something against you."

  "He wanted you to take it out on me," I said.

  "I guess that's right," assented the guard; "but you go on doing your work and I won't bother you. I don't get pleasure out of beating the men the way some of the others do."

  "I guess you're a pretty decent fellow," I said.

  After I had cut a number of building blocks to the correct size, the guard told me to carry them over to the walls. The guard at the walls told me where to put them down, and I deposited them beside a woman slave who was laying mortar. As I did so, she turned and looked at me, and my heart leaped to my mouth—it was Duare.

  I was about to speak, but she silenced me with a finger to her lips; and then she whispered out of the corner of her mouth, "They will beat us both if we speak."

  I felt a stinging lash across my back, and turned to face the guard who was overseeing the work at this part of the wall. "What do you mean by loafing around here?" he demanded.

  My first impulse was to kill him, and then I thought of Duare. I knew I must suffer anything, for now I must live. I turned and walked away to bring more rock. The fellow struck me again as I was going, the lash wrapping around my body and bringing blood.

  When I got back to my rock pile the guard there saw the welts on my body. "Why did you get those?" he asked.

  "The guard at the wall said that I was loafing," I replied.

  "Were you?" he asked.

  "You know that I do not loaf," I answered.

  "That's right," he said; "I'll go with you the next load you carry."

  I picked up two more of the building stones, which was one more than any of the other slaves could carry, and started back toward the wall, my guard accompanying me.

  When I put the rocks down by Duare, I stooped close to her and brushed my arm against her body. "Courage," I whispered. "I will find a way."

  As I stood up the wall guard came up, swinging his whip.

  "Loafing around here again, hey?" he demanded, carrying his whip hand back.

  "He was not loafing," said my guard. "Leave him alone; he belongs to me."

  "I'll whip any lazy slave I want to," said the wall guard; "and you, too, as far as that's concerned;" and he started to lay the lash on my guard. I jumped him then and seized his whip. It was a foolish thing to do, but I was seeing red. I took the whip away from him as easily as though he had been a baby; and when he drew an r-ray pistol I took that from him, too.

  Now Stalar came charging up. "What's going on here?" he demanded.

  "This slave just tried to kill me," said the wall guard; "he should be beaten to death."

  Duare was looking on, her eyes wide with terror—terror for what might be going to happen to me. I must say that I was considerably concerned myself, for my brief experience with these cruel, sadistic guards suggested that Stalar might order the wall guard's suggestion put into execution. Then my guard intervened.

  "If I were you, Stalar," he said, "I'd do nothing of the sort. This guard was attacking me when the slave came to my rescue. He did nothing more than disarm the man. He offered him no harm."

  I could see that Stalar was furious, but he only said, "Get back to your work, all of you; and see that there is no more of this." And then his eyes fell upon Duare. "Get to work, slave," he snapped, and raised his whip to strike her. I stepped between them. "Don't!" I said. Stalar hesitated. He will never know how near death he was then, but he was yellow all the way through, and he was afraid of me.

  "Get to work," he repeated, and turned on his heel and walked away.

  I went back to my rock pile then with my guard. "That was very decent of you," I said, "and I thank you, but won't you get into trouble?"

  "No," he said. "Jeft, the jong is my uncle."

  I looked at him in surprise. "I must say," I blurted carelessly, "you don't take after your uncle."

  To my relief the guard grinned. "My mother was a Pangan slave woman," he said. "I think I must take after her. The Pangans are not a cruel people."

  This guard, whose name was Omat, had revealed such a surprisingly sympathetic nature that I felt that I might with safety ask a favor of him, and I was about to broach the matter when he, himself, gave me an opening.

  "Why did you risk your life to protect that slave girl from Stalar?" he asked. "It seems to me that you have already stirred up enough trouble for yourself without doing that."

  "She is my mate," I said. "We were captured by the Falsans and separated. I had no idea what had become of her until I saw her laying mortar at that wall. I wish that I might talk with her."

  He thought this over for a moment and then he said, "Perhaps I can arrange it for you. You are a good worker, and I don't think you would ever make any trouble if they left you alone. You have done twice the work for me of any other slave, and you have done it without grumbling."

  Chapter LI

  THAT EVENING, when the female slaves brought our supper to us, I noticed that Omat was in charge of them. He called my name, and when I answered and walked over to him, I saw that Duare was with him. I had not noticed her at first because she had been hidden from me by some of the other slave women.

  "Here is your mate," said Omat. "I shall let her remain here while you eat; and you needn't hurry," he added.

  I took Duare's hand and pressed it, and we walked off to one side, a little way from the other slaves, and sat down on the ground together. At first neither of us could speak; we just sat there holding hands.

  Presently Duare said, "I never expected to see you again. What strange fate brought us together again in Jangor?"

  " Providence has been so unkind to us," I said, "that maybe it is trying to make it up to us a little now. But tell me what happened to you, and how it is that you are here."

  "It is not a very pleasant story," she said.

  "I know, dear," I said, "but tell me what you did after you killed Vantor—and of course it was you who killed him."

  She nodded. "Yes. It was in the middle of the night. Everybody on the ship was asleep, including the sentry at the door, which had been left open. I simply walked out; it was that easy; but I didn't know which way to go. My only thought was to get away somewhere and hide, for I knew that if they caught me they would kill me because of what I had done. And in the morning I lay down in some tall grass and slept. When I awoke I saw the battle fleet of the Falsans moving toward the east. I knew you were with it, and though I never expected to see you again, I went along in the same direction, to be as near to you as possible.

  "After a while I came to a little stream where I drank and bathed; and then, refreshed, I went on again; but by this time the fleet was out of sight. And then in the middle of the afternoon I saw one of those little scout ships coming toward me and I hid, but evidently they had seen me, for they came directly to my hiding place.

  "Half a d
ozen of these terrible Hangors got out of the ship and seized me. It would have been as senseless as it would have been futile to try to escape them.

  "I soon realized that I had fallen into the hands of some very terrible people, and that it was useless to expect either sympathy or kindness from them. Like the bandits they are, they were out looking for any sort of loot or prey they could find. They send these ships out constantly and sometimes in great numbers, especially after a battle between the Falsans and the Pangans, when they prey upon disabled ships, looting them and taking prisoners.

  "The ship I was on was really scouting the battle that they knew was imminent, but in the meantime looking for anything else they could pick up. They continued on to the west and presently discovered our disabled anotar. They could not make out what it was, and when I told them they would not believe me, and one of them flew into a terrible rage because he thought that I was lying to them. I sometimes think that many of them are quite mad."

  "I am sure of it," I said. "No normal mind could be as cruel and unreasoning as some of these Hangors. But go on with your story."

  "There is not much more to it," she replied. "They stole everything that they could from the anotar, demolished the instruments and the engine, and then came back toward Hangor; and here I am and here are you."

  "At least we are together again," I said, "and that is something; for now we can plan on escaping."

  "You are always the optimist," said Duare.

  "I have escaped before," I reminded her.

  "I know," she said, "but somehow this seems so terribly hopeless. Even if we escape from Hangor, we have no way of escaping from the country. Our beloved anotar has been destroyed, and from what I have been told, the mountains to the south are absolutely impassable; and the land is full of enemies."

  "I refuse to give up hope," I said.

  "What became of poor Ero Shan?" she asked, after a moment's silence.

  "He is here," I said; "and I have another friend here, a Pangan officer named Banat . Between the four of us we may be able to cook up some scheme for escape. By the way, where are you quartered?"

  "It is just the other side of that wall," she said. "The men's and the women's compounds adjoin. They tell me that they used to herd them all in together, but there were so many fights, and so many men slaves were killed, that they had to segregate them."

  The slaves had finished their meal by this time and the women had returned from their compound to take away the empty bowls. Omat came with them, and beckoned to Duare. We stood up, and I held her in my arms for just a moment; then she was gone. It was good to have had her to myself for even this short time and I felt far more hopeful than I had since she had been taken from the Falsan flagship, though I must admit that my hope lived on very meager fare.

  After Duare left I went over and sat down with Ero Shan and Banat .

  "Why didn't you come over and see Duare?" I asked Ero Shan.

  "You could have so little time together," he said, "that I did not want to rob you of any of it."

  "She inquired about you," I said, "and I told her that you were here and that we also had another friend in Banat ; and the four of us should be able to work out some plan whereby we might escape."

  "Whatever it is," said Ero Shan, "you can count me in on it. I would rather be killed trying to escape than to remain here to be beaten to death."

  The next day Stalar assigned me to another job. I was sent with a dozen other slaves, who, for one reason or another, he particularly disliked, to a large corral where a number of zorats were kept. It was so filled with accumulated filth that the animals were knee deep in it, and could move around only with the greatest effort.

  While the work was offensive and nauseating in the extreme, it had one advantage in that the guards were not near enough to us to crack us with their whips; and as they wouldn't come down into the filth, they sat on the fence and swore at us.

  This was all right while we were loading the carts, but we had to push them about a mile outside the city to dump them, where their contents could later be used for fertilizing the fields where they raised vegetables and grain for the zorats that are kept up. It was while we were pushing the carts that the guards could get at us, and then they made up for lost time. One of the guards soon discovered that I was much stronger and much faster than any of the other slaves, so he attached himself to me and made a game of it. He laid wagers with another guard that I could load faster, pull heavier loads, and get them out to the dumping ground sooner than any of the other slaves; and in order to encourage me, he laid on with his lash.

  I took it because I had found Duare, and I didn't want anything to happen to me now.

  The other guard had picked out a husky slave, on which he had placed his wager, and he stood over him, lashing him furiously to make him work faster. The wager was on the number of full loads we could take out to the dump during the remainder of the day and a certain amount of money was to be paid on each load which either slave took out more than the other.

  It was soon obvious that I should win money for my guard, but the fellow was greedy to collect all that he could; so he lashed me out and lashed me back, until I was covered with raw welts and the blood was running down my back and sides.

  Notwithstanding my anger and my suffering, I managed to control my temper until I felt that I could stand no more. On one trip I got out to the dump after the others had all unloaded and started the return trip to the corral. This left my guard and myself alone at the dump, a mile away from the city and with no one near us. I am a very powerful man but I was about ready to drop from exhaustion. The afternoon was only about half over, and I knew that the fool would kill me if this went on until night; and as we reached the dump I turned and faced him, leaning on the forked tool which I had been using to load and unload the cart.

  "If you were not a fool," I said, "you would not waste your energy and mine by beating me. Pretty soon I shall not have strength enough left to pull the cart after I have loaded it."

  "Shut up, you lazy beast!" he cried, "and get to work;" and then he came for me with his whip again.

  I jumped forward and seized the whip and jerked it from his hand; and when he started to draw his pistol, I raised the tool as though it had been a spar and drove it into his chest.

  It must have pierced his heart, for he died almost instantly. I stooped over his body and took his r-ray pistol from him, concealing it beneath my loincloth; then I laid him near the cart and unloaded its contents upon him until he was completely hidden—a filthy thing buried beneath filth.

  Chapter LII

  I HAD MURDERED a guard and I could imagine what the penalty would be, but I hoped that I had hidden the evidence of my crime sufficiently well to prevent detection. Unless the body were discovered, they couldn't very well establish the corpus delicti; in fact, they couldn't even know that a crime had been committed. However, I will admit that I was a little bit nervous as I returned to the corral alone, and I was still more nervous when the other guard, who had accepted the wager, accosted me.

  "Where is your guard?" he demanded.

  "He followed you back," I said. "He thought that you were having other guards' slaves help your slave load his cart, and he wanted to catch you at it."

  "He's a liar," snapped the man, looking around. "Where is he?"

  "He must be here," I said, "for he is not with me;" and then I started loading my cart again.

  The disappearance of my guard might have constituted an absorbing mystery if the other guard had told anybody about it, but he didn't. He was too crooked and too greedy. Instead, he told me to slow down or he would beat the life out of me.

  "If you will protect me from the other guards," I said, "I will work so slow that you will be sure to win."

  "See that you do," he said; and so I took it easy all the rest of the afternoon.

  At quitting time the guard whose slave had been pitted against me was really worried. He had won his wager, but there was
no one from whom to collect his winnings.

  "Are you sure your guard came back to the corral?" he asked me.

  "That's where he said he was going when he left me," I replied. "Of course, I was working so hard that I didn't watch him."

  "It is very strange," he said. "I can't understand it."

  When the women slaves brought our food to us that evening Omat was not with them, but Duare was there and she brought my bowl to me. Ero Shan and Banat were with me. I had outlined a bold plan to them and they both had agreed to see it through or die in the attempt.

  As Duare joined us we gathered around her, trying to hide her from the guards; and then we moved off into a far corner of the compound, in the shadow of one of the shelters beneath which the slaves slept.

  Duare sat down on the ground and we crowded around her, effectually hiding her from view from any part of the compound. There were only two guards, and they were engrossed in conversation. One of them had come with the women, and when they left he would leave, returning only when they collected the empty bowls. The guards were always sleepy at night and they didn't bother us unless some slave raised a disturbance, and night offered the only rest that we had from their cruelty.

  As I ate I explained my plan to Duare, and presently I saw that she was crying. "Why the tears?" I asked. "What is the matter?"

  "Your poor body," she said; "it is covered with welts and blood. They must have beaten you horribly today."

  "It was worth it," I said, "for the man who did it is dead, and I have his pistol hidden beneath my loincloth. Because of these welts, which will soon heal, we have a chance to escape."

  "I am glad you killed him," she said. "I should have hated to live on, knowing that a man who had treated you so still lived."

  After a while the women slaves came back and collected the empty bowls, and we were fearful that one of the slave women might discover Duare and expose her; but if any of them saw her, they said nothing; and they were soon gone, and their guard with them.