Jongor saw and felt the rising vortex. He urged the dino forward; begged it, coaxed it, pleaded with it, swore at it. And it responded! Gathering its great muscles, it hurled itself into the careening winds.
If they could get close to the building which housed the machinery that created the vortex, they would be safe. Hofer would not dare bring a vortex in upon himself. But could they get there in time?
The dinos swept down the main street in a thundering flood. Some of them took other avenues. They leaped over fallen columns, floundered over stone from buildings that had collapsed.
Dust was rising into the air, sucked upward by the vortex. Small stones, sand, were going upward. Then larger stones. Then Jongor saw, off to the right, one of his faithful dinos rise into the air. It sailed overhead, kicking and floundering in bellowing confusion.
JONGOR knew they had to get through in moments, or they would be crushed to a pulp.
“Faster!” he whispered. “Oh, little one, if you love me, move faster!”
The “little one” put on a prodigious spurt. And that spurt carried it and its riders through the vortex, right up to the domed building where Hofer had taken mad refuge!
“We’ve got him licked!” Alan Hunter yelled. “We’re through!”
“Not yet,” Jongor answered grimly. As if in answer, a rifle spoke from the window. The bullet screamed past the giant’s face. He ducked.
“Through the arch, little one,” he commanded. “Into the building!”
The dino, charged. Its huge flanks scraped on the sides of the arch, so that its riders were in imminent danger of being crushed.
“Inside!” Jongor commanded.
The dinosaur grunted. Falling stones rained around it. It grunted again, and crashed through—into the power room and laboratory of the Murians, the seat of operations from which Hofer directed the “shaking death.”
But Hofer was no longer there.
“He’s escaped!” Alan Hunter groaned. “He’s gotten away!” Jongor’s swift glance swept the room. He saw the humming machinery, knew that this was the place. Besides the rifle shot had come from this huge room. But Hofer was nowhere to be seen—“There he is!” Ann Hunter shouted, pointing out the window.
Jongor took one look through the window, and even his stout heart threatened to fail. Emerging from another building was—the airship of the Murians! Hofer was at the controls, struggling to get the ship out of the hangar.
He had eluded his pursuers. They had blasted him from the laboratory, but he had escaped to the ship. The vessel, the last relic of those curious flying ships built by the Murians, would not rise very high in the air.
It would not rise high enough to fly over the mountains and out of Lost Land; but if Hofer could get it into the air, he could pick the helpless trio off one by one with his deadly rifle. They would have no chance to escape. The guide could hunt them down at his leisure.
Jongor leaped from the back of the dinosaur. He hurled himself through the window, and when he hit the ground, he was running. Straight at the moving ship he sped, covering the ground in giant strides.
Hofer saw him coming. He released the controls and reached for his rifle, kicking open the door so he could fire out.
Jongor launched the spear. With all the strength in his mighty muscles, he hurled it. Straight as an arrow from his great bow, it sped through the open door, and into and through Hofer’s evil heart.
A startled expression appeared in the guide’s eyes. The rifle fell from nerveless fingers. He reached up and tried to pluck the spear from his chest. A cough husked on his lips, a spray of blood frothed outward. He started to fall but he was dead before he reached the floor.
The airship settled back to the ground.
“NOW we will leave,” said Jongor.
“We will go to your world.”
“It’s your world too,” Ann said.
“Your darned right it is,” said Alan. “And whether the country knows it or not, it owes you a debt for what you did tonight, John Gordon. You will probably never get paid, things being what they are.”
“I do not want a reward,” he said. His eyes sought those of the girl. “What I have is reward enough.”
“Some day,” he continued, “we will return here. In your—my—world there must be wise men who can profit by studying the works of the Muros. We will return with them, and live again in Lost Land, for a while. But now we will go and see what lies beyond the mountains.”
NOT that day, nor the next, but days later, the chattering remnants of the Murians watched the departure of a young fellow and a girl obviously very much in love with him.
“The great giant goes,” the Murians said.
“And the girl who was to have been the bride of the sun,” said a third excitedly, “see how carefully the great giant helps her up.”
Jongor was saying softly, “To the pass, little one. And keep your scaly snout to the front so you can see where you are going. Otherwise I will punch you in the eye.”
Not that such drastic treatment was necessary. For a few minutes later Alan Hunter took up where Jongor had left off.
“Forward, my lumbering-lummox! Get ye hence, O scourge of unnumbered garbage dumps. And look ye not back! Because if you do, you’re going to blush like hell. The way your master and his girlfriend are carrying on is positively a scandal!”
[1] “Lost Land”, then, is none other than an outpost of the great continent of Mu, which disappeared into the Pacific countless centuries ago, carrying to its doom a civilization which has been the subject of fascinating conjecture for many years.—Ed.
[2] The past century or so has seen the rise, and fall of anarchism as a political faith. Anarchism does not believe in the structure of modem governments, is against governmental organization and compulsion. Advocates of the theory have, more often than not been fanatics, even assassins.
Obviously Hofer is more of a madman than a political revolutionary—anarchism being the most absolute form of revolution yet preached. As a mad anarchist, his frantic efforts to gain control of the Murian vortex arc entirely logical and in keeping with his deranged mentality.—Ed.
[3] To what extent the mechanical ingenuity of the people of Mu asserted itself, we may never know for a certainty. But being an Intelligent race, a race of builders and colonizers, it may be that their knowledge of artificially controlling air currents far transcends any discoveries yet made by the races that came after them.
It was only a hundred years ago that Matthew Fontaine Maury began his great researches which led to the founding of modem meteorology—weather forecasting. And even today, weather predictions are still one of the amusing uncertainties of everyday life.
Who knows but what the ancient races of Mu and Atlantis, and perhaps other civilizations whose records have been obliterated by time, made original discoveries in electricity, astronomy, meteorology and engineering—how were the monuments on Easter Island erected?—which surpassed any findings subsequently brought to light by their later descendants.—Ed.
“SH!” Jongor said.
Behind him, Ann and Alan Hunter were suddenly silent. Jongor bent again over the jungle pool. Ann Hunter and her brother watched. It was the hour of dusk. The three, searching for water, had found this pool. As they approached it to drink, Jongor had suddenly held them back. With all the cautious alertness he displayed in stalking a dangerous enemy, he had approached the pool, then had knelt beside it. Staring with fixed gaze at the water, he knelt there now.
To the casual eye, it was a perfectly ordinary pool of water. Formed by a small stream that trickled down the side of the mountain, it was not over four feet in width, and in the deepest place the water was not two feet in depth. Silver flashes in the water showed where a school of minnows was playing and tracks at the edge revealed that small animals had come here to drink. The pool did not look dangerous.
Jongor could not have watched it more intently if it had harbored his deadliest enemy.
&
nbsp; “What, is he doing?” Ann Hunter fidgeted.
“Keep quiet, sis,” Alan Hunter answered. “I don’t know what he’s doing, but I’m willing to bet he knows.”
The girl did not much like to be told to keep quiet, but she obeyed. Ann Hunter was no longer the spoiled socialite who had penetrated this Australian wilderness in search of her brother. The jungle of Lost Land had changed her. Her hair was no longer done in the latest style. It was bobbed short. The jungle does not tolerate long hair. Her nails were no longer manicured and polished, her hands white, her complexion the perfect product of the best beauty salons, her clothes the most expensive creations of the exclusive Fifth Avenue shops. She had been too long in the jungle for any of the frills of civilization to survive. ; Her dress was a short skirt, much mended and patched her shoes, were moccasins that Jongor himself had made from deer skin, her skin was sun brown, and her face had begun to show signs of freckles. Now she looked, and was fit and the light rifle she carried in the crook of her arm made her look like a huntress from some long-lost dawn world, a huntress who had somehow managed to obtain a modern weapon.
“Look!” the girl whispered, pointing to the pool. “What’s happening
to the surface of that water?”
Jongor still knelt beside the pool. His keen, jungle-trained ears must have caught the girl’s whisper, but he gave no indication that he had heard. His attention was concentrated on the water.
The pool was changing. The clear water was turning black. Jongor had not touched or in any way disturbed the water but a black film was spreading over the surface of the pool.
“Jongor! What is it?” the girl asked.
“Shut up, sis,” Alan Hunter hissed. “Don’t bother him. He knows what he is doing.” There was a touch of awe in the youth’s voice. He trusted Jongor implicitly, but he never could quite forget the strangeness of the black-haired, gray-eyed giant kneeling beside the pool. To Alan Hunter, Jongor was a strange man.[1] But what was happening to the pool was stranger even than Jongor.
THE blackness was continuing to grow. It was coming from no apparent source but it was spreading over the surface of the water. The pool was beginning to look like ink. Alan Hunter watched uneasily. Jongor did not move a muscle. Coming from somewhere far distant in the jungle, the youth heard a thin babble of sound, like many voices raised in a shouted chorus. It died quickly. There was no other sound.
Streaks of light began to appear on the black surface of the pool. To Alan Hunter, the streaks of light looked a little like heat-lightning dancing across the face of a far-distant thunder cloud on a summer night. He caught himself listening for the rumble of thunder far away, then shrugged the fantasy aside. The surface of the pool was not a thunder storm in miniature, even if it did look like that. He wondered what it really was. Ordinary jungle pools did not turn black and streaks of light did not dance across their surface.
Again the youth was aware of the babble, of sound in the distance. It was gone before he was sure he heard it. He turned his attention back to the pool.
Abruptly the flashes of light stopped appearing. In a split second, the blackness vanished from the surface of the pool. The clear, sparkling water was again revealed. In the depths the school of minnows came out of their hiding place and began again to play. Whatever had happened, it was finished. Jongor was rising to his feet.
“What was that, Jongor?” Ann Hunter asked.
The face of the giant was grave. “A message,” he said.
“A message?” the startled girl echoed.
Jongor smiled at her. “That was the water writing of Queen Nesca,” he explained. His eyes were thoughtful. He did not realize that Ann and Alan Hunter would not understand what he had said. Because he knew what had happened, he assumed they would also know.
“Queen Nesca!” Ann Hunter gasped. “Water writing! What are you talking about? I—I—” At a loss for words, she hesitated.
“I’m sorry,” Jongor quickly apologized. “I had forgotten you did not know about Queen Nesca. I will try to explain. Queen Nesca wished to send me a message. She wrote it on water, knowing that no matter where I was, the next time I approached a pool of water, the message would appear before me on the surface of the liquid.” Again the giant smiled at her. “Now do you understand?” he questioned.
The girl stared at him in bewilderment. His explanation only added to her confusion. If he had said the message had been sent by a special kind of radio that transmitted its radiations through water instead of through ether, she might have grasped an inkling of his meaning. “Water writing?” she whispered. “That—that—” She intended to say that water writing was impossible but she caught herself before the words were uttered. She had seen too many things happen in Lost Land that she had thought were impossible, to say that water writing could not be done. After all, she had seen it happen. “But—” she protested.
“I don’t get it either,” Alan Hunter interrupted. “Sweet Pete, Jongor, did those funny flashes of light spell out a code of some kind?”
JONGOR nodded. He saw the confusion of the two. “I will try to explain,” he said. The thoughtful look persisted on his face. “Queen Nesca and I are friends. Very good friends. Once, in Lost Land, I was trapped by the teros.[2] I would not have been able to escape from those terrible birds if Queen Nesca had not come to my rescue. She saved my life, and after that, I went with her to her country, which lies in the southern section of Lost Land. There, from the lips of the Queen, I learned about water writing.”
He paused. Ann and Alan Hunter listened intently.
“When Nesca wishes to send a message to me, she goes to the place that her people call the temple of the water god,” Jongor continued. “In this temple there is a small pool of black water. Surrounding the pool are many strange instruments invented and operated by the wise men of her race. I never did understand how these devices operated, although Nesca explained it to me many times. All I could understand was that she sets the devices in operation. Then she writes her message on the pool of black water. No matter where I am, when next I approach water, or even when I lift a cup of water to my lips, the message will appear before me on the surface of the liquid. Nesca’s people use water writing as a method of communicating with each other. Now do you understand?” Jongor ended.[3]
There was doubt on the faces of both of them.
“Queen Nesca must rule a very intelligent people,” Alan Hunter said slowly.
“They call themselves Arklans,” Jongor answered. “And they say the Arklans are the oldest and the wisest race on earth.”
“Modest creatures, aren’t they?” Alan Hunter said, laughing. “I still don’t understand all you’ve told us, but if it’s all right with you, it’s all right with me. The important thing is, I’m as thirsty as a couple of camels, and if Queen Nesca’s water writing hasn’t poisoned that pool or something, I’d like to take a drink. What say, Jongor, did the message from your lady friend poison the pool?”
The giant grinned. “Not at all,” he said. “The water is perfectly good. Have a drink.”
Alan Hunter knelt beside the pool and began to drink. Ann did not move.
“Aren’t you thirsty too?” Jongor said to her.
“I’m thirsty but I can wait,” the girl answered. “D—did I understand you to say that those flashes of light on that pool were a message from this Queen Nesca?”
“Yes,” Jongor answered.
“What was the message?” the girl asked quickly. She spoke so bluntly that Jongor was a little startled. He looked at her. She blushed furiously: “It’s not that I’m trying to pry,” she hastily explained. “Your business is your business, I’m sure—”
“Why, Ann, you’re blushing!” Jongor gasped.
“I’m not!” she hotly denied.
“But you are,” the giant insisted.
“Well, what if I am?” she snapped.
Jongor stared at her in hurt surprise. Other than his mother, this was the first girl he
had ever met. He did not understand them. Quite obviously she was angry with him.
“Did—did I say something that hurt your feelings?” he asked. “I—I didn’t mean to—What’s wrong, Ann?
Did I do anything wrong?”
She didn’t answer.
Alan Hunter looked up from the pool where he was drinking. “Don’t mind sis,” he said to the perturbed giant. “She’s just jealous.” That’s all that’s wrong with her.”
“You keep out of this!” Ann snapped at her brother.
Alan grinned impishly.
“Jealous?” Jongor questioned. “I do not understand. What does being jealous mean?”
“In this case it means that you got a message from a lady-friend and Ann doesn’t like, it,” Alan gravely explained. “It also means that she is dying to know what was in that message—Hey, sis, don’t throw that big rock at me.”
Ann had picked up a handful of pebbles and was bombarding her brother with them. “I told you to keep out of this,” she said hotly.
“I wasn’t doing anything,” her brother defended.
“You keep your big mouth shut.”
She reached for another handful of pebbles but Alan quickly retreated to the shelter of a tree. Jongor regarded the pair with tolerant amusement. The look of amusement faded from his face when peace was restored and Alan, coming out from behind the tree, said, “Sis probably had a good idea after all, Jongor. What was in that message from your lady friend?”
The giant looked perturbed. “The message?” he faltered. Obviously he did not want to talk.
“Of course, if it was something private—” Alan hinted. “If it was an invitation to resume your love-life, naturally you don’t need to tell us—Hey, you aren’t listening!”
Jongor- the Complete Tales Page 9
