Delphi Collected Works of Edgar Rice Burroughs (Illustrated) (Series Four Book 26)

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

  Lodivarman laughed. “Why should I spare you?” he demanded. “It was a woman who made me a leper. Let her sin be upon all women. The accursed creature! From that moment I have hated women; even while I have held them in my arms I have hated them, but some malignant demon has thwarted me. Never has a woman contracted leprosy from me; yet I always hope, and the more beautiful and young they are the higher rises my hope, for once I was young and beautiful until that accursed woman robbed me of happiness and took away from me all except the life I had grown to hate; but perhaps in you my revenge shall be consummated as I have always hoped. With you it seems that it must be fulfilled, for you are very young and by far the most beautiful woman that has been offered in atonement for the sin of her sister. I shall tell you the story; I tell it to each of them that they may know how well they deserve whatever fate the gods may hold in store for them, because, like the accursed one, they are women.

  “It was many years ago. I was in the prime of my youth and my beauty. I had ridden out to hunt My Lord the Tiger with a hundred courtiers and a thousand men-at-arms. The hunt was a success. Upon that wall beside you the artist has painted Lodivarman slaying the great beast. Never shall I forget the day of our triumphal return, of Lodidhapura. Ah, Siva, no, never shall I forget. It was a day of triumph, a day of discovery, and the day of my cruel undoing by the foul creature whose sin you are to expiate.

  “It was upon that day that I first tasted a mushroom. At a little village in the jungle a native upon bended knee offered me a platter of this then strange food. I partook. Never in my life had I tasted a viand more delicious. Dismounting, I sat beneath a tree before the hut of the poor peasant, and there I ate all of the mushrooms that he had prepared — a great platter of them — but I did not seem able to satisfy my craving for them, nor have I since then. I questioned him as to what they were and how they grew, and I gave orders that he be brought to Lodidhapura and given the means to propagate the royal food. He still lives. He has been showered with honors and riches, and still he raises mushrooms for Lodivarman; nor may any other in the realm raise them, nor any but the King partake of them. And thus there occurred a great happiness and a great satisfaction upon the selfsame day that saw all else snatched from me.

  “As we entered Lodidhapura later in the day, crowds lined the avenue to see their King. They sang and shouted in welcome and threw blossoms at us. My charger, frightened by the noise and the bombardment of blossoms, became unmanageable, and I was hurled heavily to the ground; whereat a woman of the crowd rushed forward and threw herself upon me and with her arms about me covered my face and mouth with kisses. When my courtiers reached my side and dragged her from me and lifted me to my feet, it was seen that the woman was a leper. A great cry of horror arose, and the people who had come to applaud me shrank away, and even my courtiers drew to one side; and alone I mounted my horse and alone I rode into the city of Lodidhapura.

  “Within an hour I was stricken; these hideous sores came upon my body as by magic, and never since have I been free from them. Now you shall have them, woman — daughter of a woman. As I have rotted, so shall you rot; as I am loathed, so shall you be loathed; as my youth and beauty were blasted, so shall yours be. Come!” and he laid a heavy hand upon the arm of Fou-tan.

  Gordon King, entering the dimly lighted corridor, paused a moment to listen, to note if he might not hear voices that would guide him to those he sought. As he stood there thus, he saw a door open farther along the corridor and a man back out whom he instantly recognized as the major-domo. King looked for a place to hide, but there was no hiding-place; the corridor was straight and none too wide, and it was inevitable that he would be discovered if the major-domo came that way, as he did immediately after he had closed the door of the apartment he had just quitted.

  King grasped at the only chance that occurred to him for disarming the suspicions of the major-domo. Snapping to rigid attention, he stood as though a posted sentry just inside the entrance to the corridor. The major-domo saw him, and a puzzled frown crossed the man’s face as he approached along the corridor, halting when he came opposite King.

  “What do you here, man?” he demanded suspiciously.

  “By the command of Lodivarman, the King, I have been posted here with orders to let no one enter.”

  The major-domo seemed puzzled and rather at a loss as to what action he should take in the matter. He thought of returning to Lodivarman for verification of the warrior’s statement, but he knew the short temper of his King and hesitated to incur his wrath in the event that the warrior had spoken the truth. “The King said naught to me of this,” he said. “He commanded me to see that no one entered this wing of the palace.”

  “That is what I am here for,” replied King; “and, furthermore, I must tell you that nothing was said to me about you and, therefore, I must order you to leave at once.”

  “But I am the major-domo,” said the man haughtily.

  “But I am the King’s sentry,” replied the American, “and if you wish to question the King’s orders, let us go to Lodivarman together and see what he has to say about it.”

  “Perhaps he forgot that he had ordered a sentry posted here,” temporized the major-domo. “But how else could you have been posted here other than by orders from an officer of the King?”

  “How else indeed?” inquired the American.

  “Very well,” snapped the major-domo. “See that you let no one enter,” and he was about to pass on when King detained him.

  “I have never been posted here before,” he said; “perhaps you had better tell me if there is any other doorway in the corridor through which anyone might enter this section of the palace, that I may watch that also; and also if there is anyone here beside the King.”

  “Only the King and an apsaras are here,” replied the man. “They are in that room from which you saw me come. The doorway this side upon the right leads down a flight of steps to a corridor that terminates at a door opening into the royal garden at this end of the palace. It is never used except by Lodivarman, and as the door is heavily barred upon the inside and a sentry posted upon the outside, there is no likelihood that anyone will enter there, so that there remains only this doorway to be guarded.”

  “My zeal shall merit the attention of the King,” said the sentry, as the major-domo passed on into the banquet hall and disappeared from view.

  The moment that the man was out of sight King hastened quickly up the corridor and paused before the door, behind which the major-domo told him he had left Lodivarman and Fou-tan. As he paused he heard a woman’s voice raised in a cry of terror; it came from beyond the heavy panels of the door, and it was scarcely voiced ere Gordon King pushed the portal aside and stepped into the room.

  Before nun Fou-tan was struggling to release herself from the clutches of Lodivarman. Horror and revulsion were written large upon her countenance, while rage and lust distorted the hideous face of the Leper King.

  At the sight of the warrior Lodivarman’s face went livid with rage even greater than that which had been dominating him.

  “How dare you!” he screamed. “You shall die for this. Who sent you hither?”

  Gordon King closed the door behind him and advanced toward Lodivarman.

  “Gordon King!” cried the girl, her astonishment reflected in her tone and in the expression upon her face. For an instant hope sprang to her eyes, but quickly it faded to be replaced by the fear that she felt for him now as well as for herself. “Oh, Gordon King, they will kill you for this!”

  And now Lodivarman recognized him, too. “So you are the warrior who slew the tiger single-handed!” he cried. “What brought you here?”

  “I have come for Fou-tan,” said King simply.

  Lodivarman’s rotting face twitched with rage. He was rendered speechless by the effrontery of this low knave. Twice he tried to speak, but his anger choked him; and then he sprang for a cord that depended against one of the walls, but King guessed his purpose and forestalled hi
m. Springing forward, he grasped Lodivarman roughly by the shoulder and hurled him back. “Not a sound out of you,” he said, “or Lodidhapura will be needing a new king.”

  It was then that Lodivarman found his voice. “You shall be boiled in oil for this,” he said in a low voice.

  “Then I might as well kill you,” said Gordon King, “for if I have to die, it is well that I have my vengeance first,” and he raised his spear as though to cast it.

  “No, no!” exclaimed Lodivarman. “Do not kill me. I grant you pardon for your great offence.”

  King could not but marvel at the workings of the great law of self- preservation that caused this diseased and rotten thing, burdened by misery, hatred, and unhappiness, so tenaciously to cling to the hope of life.

  “Come, come!” cried Lodivarman. “Tell me what you want and be gone.”

  “I told you what I wanted,” said King. “I came for Fou-tan.”

  “You cannot have her,” cried Lodivarman. “She is mine. Think you that a woman would leave a king for you, knave?”

  “Ask her,” said King; but there was no need to ask her. Fou-tan crossed quickly to the American’s side.

  “Oh, Lodivarman,” she cried, “let me go away in peace with this warrior.”

  “It is that or death, Lodivarman,” said King coldly.

  “That or death,” repeated Lodivarman in a half whisper. “Very well, then, you have won,” he added presently. “Go in peace and take the girl with you.” But even if he had not noted the cunning expression in the King’s eyes, Gordon King would not have been deceived by this sudden acquiescence to his demand.

  “You are wise, Lodivarman,” he said— “wise to choose the easiest solution to your problem. I, too, must be guided by wisdom and by my knowledge of the ways of tyrants. Lie down upon the floor.”

  “Why?” demanded Lodivarman. “What would you do to me? Do you forget that I am a king, that my person is holy?”

  “I remember that you are a man and that men may die if, living, they present an obstacle to another man who is desperate. Lodivarman, you must know that I am desperate.”

  “I have told you that you might go in peace,” said the monarch. “Why would you humiliate me?”

  “I have no desire to humiliate you, Lodivarman. I only wish to assure myself that you will not be able to give the alarm before Fou-tan and I are beyond the walls of Lodidhapura. I would secure you so that you cannot leave this chamber; and as you have given orders that no one is to enter this part of the King’s house until you summon, it will be morning, at least, before you can despatch warriors in pursuit of us.”

  “He speaks the truth,” said Fou-tan to the King; “you will not be harmed.”

  For a moment Lodivarman stood silent as though in thought, and then suddenly and quite unexpectedly he leaped straight for King, striking up the warrior’s spear and endeavoring to clutch him by the throat. Lodivarman was no coward.

  So impetuous was the leper’s charge that King was borne backward beneath the man’s weight. His heel caught in the fold of a tiger skin upon the floor, and he fell heavily backward with Lodivarman upon him. The fingers of the leper were already at his throat; the rotting face was close to his; the odor of fetid breath was in his nostrils. But only for an instant did the Khmer King have an advantage. As he raised his voice to summon help, the hand of the American found his throat, choking out the sound even as it was born. Youth and strength and endurance all were upon the side of the younger man. Slowly he wormed his body from beneath that of the King; and then, kicking one of Lodivarman’s braced feet from beneath him, he rolled the Khmer over upon his back and was upon him. Lodivarman’s grip was wrenched from King’s throat, and now the Khmer was gasping for breath as he fought, violently but futilely, to disengage himself from the clutches of the man upon him.

  “Lie still,” said King. “Do not force me to kill you.” The repulsive sores upon the face of the King were directly beneath his eyes. Even in this tense moment that was so closely approaching tragedy, the habits of his medical training were still sufficiently strong to cause the American to give considerably more than cursory attention to these outward physical symptoms of the dread disease that had given Lodivarman the name of the Leper King; and what the doctor in him saw induced a keen regret that he could not investigate this strange case more fully.

  At King’s last command and threat, Lodivarman had ceased his struggles, and the American had relaxed his grasp upon the other’s throat. “Are there any cords attached to the hangings in the room, Fou-tan?” he demanded of the girl.

  “Yes, there are cords at the windows,” replied she.

  “Get them for me,” said the American.

  Quickly Fou-tan wrenched the cords loose from their fastenings and brought them to King, and with them the man bound the wrists and ankles of the Khmer King. So securely did he bind them and so tightly did he tie the knots that he had no fear that Lodivarman could release himself without aid; and now to be doubly certain that he could not summon assistance, King stuffed a gag of soft cloth into the mouth of his royal prisoner and bound it tightly there with another cord. Then he sprang to his feet.

  “Come, Fou-tan,” he said, “we have no time to lose; but wait, you cannot go abroad in that garb. You are to accompany me as a slave girl, not as an apsaras.”

  Fou-tan snatched off her ornate headdress and threw it upon the floor; then she loosened the golden girdle that held her voluminous skirt in place, and as it dropped to the floor King saw that she wore a silken sampot beneath it. Across a taboret was a long drape, the ends of which were spread upon the floor. This Fou-tan took and wound about her lithe form as a sarong.

  “I am ready, Gordon King,” she said.

  “The ear-rings,” he suggested, “the necklace, and your other wrist ornaments. They look too royal for a slave.”

  “You are right,” she said, as she removed them.

  King quickly extinguished the cressets, leaving the room in darkness. Then together the two groped their way to the door. Opening it a little, King looked about. The corridor was empty. He drew Fou-tan into it and closed the door behind him. To the next door in the corridor he stepped and tried it; it was not locked. He could just see the top of a flight of stone steps leading down into utter darkness. He wished that he had brought one of the cressets, but now it was too late. He drew Fou-tan within and closed the door, and now they could see nothing.

  “Where does this lead?” asked Fou-tan in a whisper.

  “It is the King’s private passage to the garden,” replied the American, “and if I have made no mistake in my calculations, the other end of it is guarded by a sentry who will pass us with a wink.”

  As they groped their way slowly down the steps and along the corridor King explained to Fou-tan the subterfuge he had adopted to obtain a place upon the guard that night and that he had particularly noticed the little door at the end of this wing of the palace and when the major-domo had told him of the private passage leading to the garden he had guessed that it ended at this very door. “The sentry there,” he had concluded, “is from my own barracks and knows the story. That is why you must be a little slave girl tonight, Fou-tan.”

  “I do not mind being a slave girl — now,” she said, and King felt the little fingers of the hand he held press his own more tightly.

  They came at last to the end of the corridor. In the darkness King’s fingers ran over the surface of the door in search of bars and bolts. The fastening, which he found at last, was massive but simple. It moved beneath the pressure of his hand with only a slight grating sound. He pushed the door slowly open; the fresh night air blew in upon them; the starlit heavens bathed the garden in gentle luminosity. Cautiously King crossed the threshold. He saw the warrior upon his post without, and instantly the man saw him.

  “Who comes?” demanded the sentry, dropping his spear-point on a level with King’s breast as he wheeled quickly toward him.

  “It is I — King — of Varna’s
ten. I have found the slave girl of whom I told you, and I would walk in the garden with her for a few moments.”

  “I do not know you,” snapped the warrior. “I never heard of you or your slave girl,” and then it was that King realized that he had never seen this man before — that the sentries had been changed since he had entered the palace. His heart sank within him, yet he maintained a bold front.

  “It will do no harm to let us pass for a while,” he said, “you can see that I am a member of the guard, as otherwise I could not have gained access to the King’s house.”

  “That may be true,” replied the warrior, “but I have my orders that no one shall pass either in or out of this doorway without proper authority. I will summon an officer. If he wishes to let you pass, that is none of my affair.”

  Fou-tan had been standing at King’s side. Now she moved slowly and languorously toward the sentry. Every undulating motion of her lithe body was provocative. She came very close to him and turned her beautiful face up toward his. Her eyes were dreamy wells of promise. “For me?” she asked in a soft, caressing voice. “For me, warrior, could you not be blind for a moment?”

  “For you, yes,” said the man huskily, “but you are not for me; you belong to him.”

  “I have a sister,” suggested Fou-tan. “When I return within the King’s house, perhaps she will come to this little door. What do you say, warrior?”

  “Perhaps it can do no harm,” he said hesitatingly. “How long will you remain in the garden?”

  “We shall be in the garden only a few minutes,” said King.

  “I shall turn my back,” said the sentry. “I have not seen you. Remember that, I have not seen you.”

  “Nor have we seen you,” replied King.

  “Do not forget your sister, little one,” said the sentry, as he turned away from them and continued along his post, while Gordon King and Fou-tan merged with the shadows of the trees beyond.

  Perhaps, hours later, when he was relieved, the sentry realized that he had been duped, but there were excellent reasons why he should keep a still tongue in his head, though he intended at first opportunity to look up this warrior who said that his name was King and demand an accounting from him. Perhaps, after all, the slave girl had had no sister, with which thought he turned on his pallet of straw and fell asleep.