Part 6 (2/2)

At last they reached the foot of the stair, and then they traversed a long straight corridor, with a blank wall on one hand pierced by an occasional arched doorith a stair leading up behind it, and on the other hand another wall showing heavy barred doors at regular intervals of a few feet

Halting before one of these doors, one of the blacks produced the key that hung at his girdle, and turned it in the lock Then, pushi+ng open the grille, they entered with their captive They were in a s, and in the opposite wall there was another grilled door What lay beyond that door Conan could not tell, but he did not believe it was another corridor The glih the bars, hinted at shadowy spaciousness and echoing depths

In one corner of the dungeon, near the door through which they had entered, a cluster of rusty chains hung fro set in the stone In these chains a skeleton dangled Conan glared at it with so the state of the bare bones, most of which were splintered and broken; the skull which had fallen froe blow of tremendous force

Stolidly one of the blacks, not the one who had opened the door, re his key on the ed the mass of rusty metal and shattered bones over to one side Then they fastened Conan's chains to that ring, and the third black turned his key in the lock of the farther door, grunting when he had assured hiarded Conan cryptically, slit-eyed ebony giants, the torch striking highlights frolossy skin

He who held the key to the nearer door was -king! None but master and we know All palace sleep We keep secret You live and die here, maybe Like him!'

He conte across the stone floor

Conan did not deign to reply to the taunt, and the black, galled perhaps by his prisoner's silence, 's face It was an unfortunate move for the black Conan was seated on the floor, the chains about his waist; ankles and wrists locked to the ring in the wall He could neither rise, nor move more than a yard out from the wall But there was considerable slack in the chains that shackled his wrists, and before the bullet-shaped head could be withdrawn out of reach, the king gathered this slack in his hty hand and smote the black on the head The man fell like a butchered ox, and his co with his scalp laid open, and blood oozing from his nose and ears

But they atteent invitation to approach within reach of the bloody chain in his hand

Presently, grunting in their ape-like speech, they lifted the senseless black and bore hi

They used his key to lock the door behind theold chain that fastened it to his girdle They took the torch with them, and as they moved up the corridor the darkness slunk behind the footsteps died aith the glimmer of their torch, and darkness and silence reed

5

The Haunter of the Pits

Conan lay still, enduring the weight of his chains and the despair of his position with the stoicism of the wilds that had bred hile of his chains, when he shi+fted his body, sounded startlingly loud in the darkness and stillness, and it was his instinct, born of a thousand wilderness-bred ancestors, not to betray his position in his helplessness This did not result fro process; he did not lie quiet because he reasoned that the darkness hid lurking dangers that ht discover him in his helplessness Xaltotun had assured him that he was not to be harmed, and Conan believed that it was in theBut the instincts of the ere there, that had caused him in his childhood to lie hidden and silent while wild beasts prowled about his covert

Even his keen eyes could not pierce the solid darkness Yet after a while, after a period of tilow becaray beauely, the bars of the door at his elbow, and even rille This puzzled him, until at last he realized the explanation He was far below ground, in the pits below the palace; yet for some reason a shaft had been constructed from somewhere above Outside, the ht slanted dimly down the shaft He reflected that in this hts Perhaps the sun, too, would shi+ne down that shaft, though on the other hand it ht be closed by day Perhaps it was a subtle ht or aze fell on the broken bones in the farther corner, gli dimly He did not tax his brain with futile speculation as to who the wretch had been and for what reason he had been doomed, but he wondered at the shattered condition of the bones They had not been broken on a rack Then, as he looked, another unsavory detail thwise, and there was but one explanation; they had been broken in that manner in order to obtain the marrow Yet what creature but man breaks bones for their marrow? Perhaps those remnants were mute evidence of a horrible, cannibalistic feast, of some wretch driven to madness by starvation Conan wondered if his own bones would be found at soht down the unreasoning panic of a trapped wolf

The Cimmerian did not curse, screaht have done But the pain and turreat limbs quivered with the intensity of his emotions Somewhere, far to the ard, the Neh the heart of his kingdom The small host of the Poitanians could not stand before theht be able to hold Tarantia for weeks, or months; but eventually, if not relieved, he reater nuainst the invaders But in the meanwhile he, Conan, must lie helpless in a darkened cell, while others led his spears and fought for his kingdoe

Then he stiffened as outside the farther door he heard a stealthy step

Straining his eyes he rille There was a rasp of ainst metal, and he heard the clink of tuure uard, he supposed, trying the lock After a while he heard the sound repeated faintly so of a door, and then a swift scurry of softly shod feet retreated in the distance Then silence fell again

Conan listened for what see time, but which could not have been, for the moon still shone down the hidden shaft, but he heard no further sound He shi+fted his position at last, and his chains clanked

Then he heard another, lighter footfall--a soft step outside the nearer door, the door through which he had entered the cell An instant later a slender figure was etched di Conan!' a soft voice intoned urgently 'Oh, uardedly, twisting his head about to stare at the apparition

It was a girl who stood grasping the bars with her slender fingers The dih the wisp of silk twisted about her loins, and shone vaguely on jeweled breast-plates Her dark eyes glealistened softly, like alabaster Her hair was a mass of dark foaht only hinted

'The keys to your shackles and to the farther door!' she whispered, and a slih the bars and dropped three objects with a clink to the flags beside him