Brood of the Dark Moon
Page 20
CHAPTER XX
_On to the Pyramid_
It was like Walt Harkness to rush impetuously after where Diane wasbeing drawn away; but who, under the same circumstances, would have doneotherwise? Yet it was like Chet, too, to keep a sane and level head, tocheck the first wild impulse to dash to their rescue, to realize that hewould be throwing himself away by doing it and helping them not at all.It was like Chet to stop and think when thinking was desperately needed,though what it would lead to he could not have told. There were manyfactors that entered into his calculations.
Half-consciously he had walked to the barricade that he might stare intothe blackness beyond. The worst of the storm had passed, and the strongEarth-light forced its way through the thinning clouds in a cold, grayglow. It served to show the great gateway to the jungle, empty andblack, until Chet saw more of the man-beasts he had called messengers.
A file of them, stolid, woodenly walking--he could not fail to know themfrom the ape-men of the tribe. And they moved through the darknesstoward the sounds of shouts and laughter.
Chet saw them when they returned; following them were three others.Schwartzmann was not one of them; but the pilot, Max, Chet coulddistinguish plainly; the other two, he was sure, were the men ofSchwartzmann's crew.
And, for each of them, all laughter and shouted jests had escaped. Theymoved like wooden toys half-come to life. And they, too, vanished whereWalt and Diane had gone through the high arch of the jungle's open door.
Chet knew Kreiss was beside him; at a short distance, Towahg, staringabove the palisade, buried his unkempt, hairy head in the shelter of hisarms. All of Towahg's savage bravery had oozed away at direct sight ofthe pyramid men; Chet, even through his heavy-hearted dismay, was awareof the courage that must have carried this primitive man to their rescueon that other black night when the pyramid had been about to swallow,them up.
* * * * *
To the pyramid all Chet's thoughts had been tending. There Diane andHarkness were bound; there he, too, must go, though the thought ofdriving himself into that black maw, through the overpowering stench anddown to the pit where some horror of mystery lay waiting, was almostmore than his conscious mind could accept. But, with the sight of Towahgand the abject fear that had overwhelmed him, Chet found his own mindcalmly determined, though through that cool self-detachment came savagespoken words.
"If poor Towahg could go near that damned place," he reasoned, "am Igoing to be stopped by anything between heaven and hell?"
And his mind was suddenly at ease with the certainty of the next step hemust take. He turned to speak to Kreiss, but paused instead to stareinto the dark where shadows that were not the ghosts of clouds weremoving. Then his whispered orders came sharply to the scientist and toTowahg.
"Come!" he commanded. "Come quickly; follow me!"
The two were behind him as he found the narrow opening in the barrier'sfarther side, passed through, and crouched low in the darkness as he rantoward the lake where the shallow water of the shore took no mark oftheir hurrying feet.
* * * * *
At the end of the lake he stopped. Beside him, Kreiss, weakened by hiswound, was panting and gasping; Towahg, moving like a dark shadow, wasclose behind.
"I saw them," said Kreiss, when he had breath enough for speech, "--morebeasts from the pyramid. They were coming for us! But we can go backthere after a day or so."
"You can," Chet told him; "Towahg and I are going on."
"Where?" Kreiss demanded.
"To the pyramid."
Chet's reply was brief, and Kreiss' response was equally so. "You're afool," he said.
"Sure," Chet told him: "I know there's nothing I can do to help them.But I'm going. All I ask is to get one crack at whatever it is that isdown in that beastly pit and if I can't do that maybe I can still saveDiane and Walt from tortures you and I can't imagine." He touched hispistol suggestively.
"Still I say you are a fool," Kreiss insisted. "They are gone--captured;they will die. That is regrettable, but it is done. Now, besides HerrSchwartzmann who escaped, only we two remain; the savage, he does notcount. We two!--and a new world!--and science! Science that remainsafter these two are gone--after you and I are gone! It is greater thanus all.
"But I, staying, shall contribute to the knowledge of men; I shall makediscoveries that will bear my name always. This world is my laboratory;I have found deposits such as none has ever seen on Earth.
"Be reasonable, Herr Bullard. The enemy has tracked us down by hissuperior cleverness. We will go far away now where he never shall findus, you and I. Do not be a fool; do not throw your life away."
* * * * *
Chet Bullard, a figure of helpless, hopeless despair, stood unspeakingwhile he stared into the black depths of the jungle, and the night windwhipped his tattered clothing about him.
"A fool!" he said at last, and his voice was dull and heavy. "I guessyou're right--"
Herr Kreiss interrupted: "Of course I am right--right and reasonable andlogical!"
Chet went on as if the other had not spoken:
"If I hadn't been a fool I would have found some way to prevent it; Iwould have killed that ape-thing when first I saw it; I would have gotthem free."
He turned slowly to face his companion in the darkness.
"But you were wrong, Kreiss; you forgot a couple of things. You saidthey found us by their superior cleverness. That's wrong. They found usbecause you left a trail they could follow. We threw them off once,Towahg and I, but the messenger wouldn't be fooled. Then Schwartzmannand his pack followed the messenger in.
"And you say it is logical that I should quit here, leave Diane and Waltto take whatever is coming; you say I'm a fool to stay with them tillthe end.
"Well,"--he was speaking very quietly, very simply--"if you are rightI'm rather glad that I'm a fool. For you see, Kreiss, they're myfriends, and between friends logic gets knocked all to hell.
"Come on, Towahg!" he called. "Let's see if we can travel this jungle inthe night!" He set off toward the fringe of great trees, then let Towahggo ahead to find a trail.
* * * * *
Travel at night through the tangle of creepers was not humanly possible.Even Towahg, after an hour's work, grunted his disgust and curledhimself up for the night. And Chet, though he found his mind filled withvain imaginings, was so drained by the day's demands on his nervousenergy that he slept through to the rising of the sun.
Then they circled wide of the trail they had taken before; no risk wouldChet take of a chance meeting with one of the pyramid apes. And heplagued his brain with vain questions of what he should do when hereached the arena and the pyramid and the unknown something that waitedwithin, until he told himself in desperation: "You're going down, you'regoing into that damned place; that's all you know for sure."
Whereupon his questioning ceased, and his mind was clear enough to thinkof giant creepers that barred his way, of streams to be crossed, and towonder, at the last, when the valley of the pyramid was in sight andwhether the others had reached there before him.
Another day's sun was beating straight down into the arena when again itopened before Chet's eyes. And the bleak horror of this place of blackand white that had seemed so incredibly unreal under Earth-lit skies wasdoubly so in the glare of noon.
They entered through the jagged crack that had been their means ofescape. An earthquake, one time, had split the stone, and Chet was morethan satisfied to avoid the broad entrance where the rocks made agateway and where hostile eyes might be watching.
* * * * *
He stood for long minutes in the cleft in the rocks where the hard earthof the arena made a floor before him, where the huge steps of ribbonedwhite and black swung out on either hand, and where, directly ahead, inthe same hard, contrasting strata, a pyramid lifted itself to finish ina projecting capstone. And now that
he faced it he found himselfcuriously cool.
He motioned Towahg to his side, and the black came cowering andtrembling. He had tried before to ask Towahg about the mystery of thepyramid, but Towahg had never understood, or, as Chet believed, he hadpretended not to understand. But now he could no longer feign ignoranceof Chet's queries.
Chet pointed to the pyramid with a commanding hand. "What is there?" hedemanded. "Towahg afraid! What is Towahg afraid of? Ape-men go inthere--Gr-r-ranga-men; who sends for them?"
And Towahg, who must know the sense of the questions, even though somewords were strange, could not answer. He dropped to his knees there inthe narrow, ragged chasm in the rock and clutched at Chet's legs withhis two hands while he buried his shaggy head in his arms. Then--
"Krargh!" he wailed; "Krargh there! Krargh send--Gr-r-ranga go.Gr-r-ranga no come back!"
It was perhaps the longest speech Towahg had ever made, and Chet noddedhis understanding. "Yes," he agreed; "that's right. I imagine. WhenKrargh sends for you, you never come back."
But more eloquent than the ape-man's halting words was the trembling ofhis muscle-knotted shoulders in a fear that struck him limp at Chet'sfeet. And the pilot realized that the fear was inspired in part by thethought in the savage mind that his master might ask him to go closer tothe place of dread. He had followed them once and had struck down amessenger, but this was when he was avid with curiosity andhalf-worshipful of the white men as gods. Now, to go that dreadful wayin full daylight!--it was more than Towahg could face.
* * * * *
Chet patted the cringing shoulder with a kindly hand. "Get up, Towahg,"he ordered and pointed back toward the jungle. "Towahg wait outside;wait today and to-night!" He gave the ape-man's sign of the open andclosed hand to signify one day and one night, and Towahg's grunt washalf in relief and half in understanding as he slipped back into hidingwhere the jungle pressed close.
Chet turned again to the pyramid. "They're down there," he told himself,"facing God knows what. And now it's sink or swim, and I'm almightyafraid I know which it's to be. But we'll take it together: 'When Krarghsends for you, you never come back.'"
No jungle sounds were here in this silent arena, no flashing ofleather-winged birds nor scuttling of little, odd creatures of theground. It was as if some terror had spread its dark wings above theplace, a terror unseen of men. But the little, wild things of earth andair had seen, and they had fled long since from a place unclean andunfit for life.
Chet felt the silence pressing heavily upon him as he took his hand fromthe rock at his side and stepped out into the arena. And the vastamphitheater seemed peopled with phantom shapes that sat in serried rowsand watched him with dead and terrible eyes, while he went the long wayto the pyramid's base, and his feet found the rough stone ascent....