Part 6 (1/2)
The balance of theate, had re-entered the building from which they had been su, painted fellows, their naked figures covered now by gorgeous robes against the chill of night As they spoke of the stranger they laughed at the ease hich they had tricked hi as they threw the silks and furs to resume their broken sluuard detailed for the gate beside which they slept, and it was equally evident that the gates were guarded and the city watched rined indeed had been the Jed of Gathol had he drea so neatly tricked
As Turan proceeded along the avenue he passed other sentries beside other doors but now he gave theed nor otherwise outwardly noted his passing; but while at nearly every turn of the erratic avenue he passed one or uess that he had passed one of them many times and that his every move atched by silent, clever stalkers Scarce had he passed a certain one of these rigid guardsmen before the fellooke to sudden life, bounded across the avenue, entered a narrow opening in the outer here he swiftly followed a corridor built within the wall itself until presently he eed a little distance ahead of Turan, where he assuuard Nor did Turan know that a second followed in the shadows of the buildings behind hient h the silent streets of the strange city in search of food and drink for the woman he loved Men and women looked down upon him from shadowy balconies, but spoke not; and sentinels saw hi the avenue before hi accouter warriors, and alht an open doorway dihted froht seek to hide fro company, and while he had passed several sentries unquestioned he could scarce hope to escape scrutiny and questioning from a patrol, as he naturally assumed this body of e turning abruptly to the right and alht within and so he stepped cautiously around the second turn the more effectually to be hidden frohted like the entrance Waiting there he heard the party approach the building, he heard so place, and then he heard the door past which he had cothe corridor; but none came He approached the turn and looked around it; the corridor was empty to the closed door Whoever had closed it had re He heard no sound Then he advanced to the door and placed an ear against it All was silence in the street beyond A sudden draft must have closed the door, or perhaps it was the duty of the patrol to see to such things It was immaterial They had evidently passed on and noould return to the street and continue upon his way Somewhere there would be a public fountain where he could obtain water, and the chance of food lay in the strings of dried vegetables andbefore the doorways of nearly every Barsoomian home of the poorer classes that he had ever seen It was this district he was seeking, and it was for this reason his search had led hiate of the city which he kneould not be located in a poor district
He attempted to open the door only to find that it resisted his every effort--it was locked upon the outside Here indeed was a sorry contretemps Turan the panthan scratched his head ”Fortune frowns upon me,” he murmured; but beyond the door, Fate, in the for Neatly had he tricked the unwary stranger The lighted doorway, thepatrol--these had been planned and timed to a nicety by the third warrior who had sped ahead of Turan along another avenue, and the stranger had done precisely what the fellow had thought he would do--no wonder, then, that he smiled
This exit barred to him Turan turned back into the corridor He followed it cautiously and silently Occasionally there was a door on one side or the other These he tried only to find each securely locked The corridor wound more erratically the farther he advanced A locked door barred his way at its end, but a door upon his right opened and he stepped into a dihted chamber, about the walls of which were three other doors, each of which he tried in turn Tere locked; the other opened upon a runway leading doard It was spiral and he could see no farther than the first turn A door in the corridor he had quitted opened after he had passed, and the third warrior stepped out and followed after hirim lips
Turan drew his short-sword and cautiously descended At the bottom was a short corridor with a closed door at the end He approached the single heavy panel and listened No sound came to him from beyond theeasily toward him at his touch Before him was a low-ceiled chamber with a dirt floor Set in its walls were several other doors and all were closed As Turan stepped cautiously within, the third warrior descended the spiral runway behind him The panthan crossed the room quickly and tried a door It was locked He heard a muffled click behind him and turned about with ready sword He was alone; but the door through which he had entered was closed--it was the click of its lock that he had heard
With a bound he crossed the rooer did he seek silence, for he kne that the thing had gone beyond the sphere of chance He threw his weight against the wooden panel; but the thick skeel of which it was constructed would have withstood a battering rah
Rapidly Turan exalance about the chamber revealed a wooden table and a bench Set in the walls were several heavy rings to which rusty chains were attached--all too significant of the purpose to which the room was dedicated In the dirt floor near the ere two or three holes reseiant Martian rat He had observed thishiht the table and the bench Placing the latter against the wall he drew the table in front of hiripped in readiness before hiht before they took hi for he knew not what No sound penetrated to his subterranean dungeon He slowly revolved in his ate; the lighted doorway--the only one he had seen thus open and lighted along the avenue he had followed; the advance of the warriors at precisely the moment that he could find no other avenue of escape or concealment; the corridors and charound prison leaving no other path for him to pursue
”By my first ancestor!” he swore; ”but it was simple and I a simpleton They trickedthemselves to a scratch; but for what purpose?”
He wished that he hts turned to the girl waiting there on the hill beyond the city for hie peoples of Barsoom No, he would never come, now He had disobeyed her He smiled at the sweet recollection of those words of command that had fallen from her dear lips He had disobeyed her and now he had lost the reward
But what of her? What noould be her fate--starving before a hostile city with only an inhuht--obtruded itself upon hihts she had witnessed in the burrows of the kaldanes and he knew that they ate hu Should he eat his rykor he would be helpless; but--there was sustenance there for them both, for the rykor and the kaldane Turan cursed himself for a fool Why had he left her? Far better to have remained and died with her, ready always to protect her, than to have left her at the mercy of the hideous Bantoomian
Now Turan detected a heavy odor in the air It oppressed hiht off the creeping lethargy, but his legs seeain to the bench Presently his sword slipped froers and he sprawled forward upon the table his head resting upon his arht wore on and Turan did not return, becan of hiof sorrow to her heart--of sorrow and loneliness She realized no she had come to depend upon this panthan not only for protection but for co him realized suddenly that he had h a friend had been taken from her--an old and valued friend She rose froht have a better view of the city
U-Dor, dwar of the 8th Utan of O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator, rode back in the early daard Manator froe As he was rounding the hills south of the city, his keen eyes were attracted by a slightthe shrubbery close to the summit of the nearest hill He halted his viciousaway from him and peer doard Manator beyond the hill
”Conalled to his followers, and with a word to this thoat turned the beast at a rapid gallop up the hillside In his wake swept his twenty savage warriors, the padded feet of their mounts soundless upon the soft turf It was the rattle of sidearht Tara of Heliu the down upon her
She glanced at Ghek What would the spiderency? She saw him crawl to his rykor and attach hiain ani for flight Well, itup the hill toward thele mediocre swordsman such as Ghek orse than no defense at all
”Hurry, Ghek!” she admonished hi-place;” but the creature only stepped between her and the onco-sword
”It is useless, Ghek,” she said, when she saw that he intended to defend her ”What can a single sword accoainst such odds?”
”I can die but once,” replied the kaldane ”You and your panthan saved me from Luud and I but do what your panthan would do were he here to protect you”
”It is brave, but it is useless,” she replied ”Sheathe your sword They may not intend us harround, but he did not sheathe it, and thus the two stood waiting as U-Dor the dwar stopped his thoat before theh circle about For a long ly first at Tara of Helium and then at her hideous companion
”What manner of creature are you?” he asked presently ”And what do you before the gates of Manator?”
”We are froirl, ”and we are lost and starving We ask only food and rest and the privilege to go our way seeking our own horiuard it alone know the age of Manator,” he said; ”yet in all the ages that have rolled by since Manator first was, there be no record in the annals of Manator of a stranger departing frohtily, ”and ive me and my companions aid and assist us to return to our own land It is the law of Barsoom”
”Manator knows only the laws of Manator,” replied U-Dor; ”but co beautiful, need have no fear I, myself, will protect you if O-Tar so decrees And as for your companion--but hold! You said 'companions'--there are others of your party then?”
”You see what you see,” replied Tara haughtily
”Be that as it may,” said U-Dor ”If there be , if your cohts well he too may live, for O-Tar is just, and just are the laws of Manator Coirl, seeing that he would have stood his ground and fought theainst their reat brain the means to outwit theht, Tara of Helium,” he replied and sheathed his sword
And so they ates of Manator--Tara, Princess of Heliu thee, painted warriors of U-Dor, dwar of the 8th Utan of O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator
CHAPTER XI
THE CHOICE OF TARA
THE dazzling sunlight of Barsooirl and her captors rode into the city through The Gate of Enemies Here the as soeithin the gate were covered with parallel shelves of , horizontal niches, stood row upon row of srotesque statuettes ofbelow their feet and soures were scarce a foot in height and but for their diht have been the irl noticed that as they passed, the warriors saluted the figures with their spears after thea military courtesy, and then they rode on into the avenue beyond, which ran, wide and stately, through the city toward the east
On either side were great buildings wondrously wrought Paintings of great beauty and antiquity covered many of the walls, their colors softened and blended by the suns of ages Upon the pavement the life of the neakened city was already afoot Wos, befeathered warriors, their bodies daubed with paint; artisans, araily caparisoned, took their various ways upon the duties of the day A giant zitidar, nificent in rich harness, ru the stone pavement toward The Gate of Eneether a picture that filled the eyes of Tara of Helium onder and with ad Mars Such had been the cities of the founders of her race before Throxeus, htiest of oceans, had disappeared from the face of a world And from balconies on either side men and women looked down in silence upon the scene below
The people in the street looked at the two prisoners, especially at the hideous Ghek, and called out in question or couard; but the watchers upon the balconies spoke not, nor did one soThere wereand not a one that did not hold its silent party of richly trapped men and women, with here and there a child or two, but even the children maintained the uniform silence and immobility of their elders As they approached the center of the city the girl saw that even the roofs bore companies of these idle watchers, harnessed and bejeweled as for sohter broke fros of the instruers
And now the avenue widened into an imleas surrounding it and its scarlet sward and gaily-flowering, green-foliaged shrubbery Toward this U-Dor led his prisoners and their guard to the great arched entrance before which a line of fifty uard recognized U-Dor the guardsh which the party passed Directly inside the entrance were inclined runways leading upward on either side U-Dor turned to the left and led the corridor Here they passed other mounted men and in chambers upon either side they saweither up or down A warrior, his steed at full gallop, dashed into sight from one of these and raced swiftly past them upon some errand
Nowhere as yet had Tara of Heliu; but when at a turn, U-Dor led thelimpses of chambers in whichwhere disames of skill or chance and many there ho played at jetan, and then the party passed into a long, wide hall of state, as hty Heliu ablaze with countless radiu the vast floor unbroken by a single column The arches were of white e blocks from which each arch was cut co was set solid about the radium bulbs with precious stones whose scintillant fire and color and beauty filled the whole apartular fringe for a few feet, where they appeared to hang like a beautiful and gorgeous drapery against the white marble of the wall The marble ended some six or seven feet fro wainscoted in solid gold The floor itself was of le rooe city
But what riveted the girl's attention even more than the fabulous treasure of decorations were the files of gorgeously harnessed warriors who sat their thoats in grim silence and immobility on either side of the central aisle, rank after rank of them to the farther walls, and as the party passed between them she could not note soof a thoat's ear
”The Hall of Chiefs,” whispered one of her guard, evidently noting her interest There was a note of pride in the fellow's voice and soreat doorway into the chae, square room in which a dozen mounted warriors lolled in their saddles
As U-Dor and his party entered the room, the warriors came quickly erect in their saddles and formed a line before another door upon the opposite side of the wall The padwar co theuard
”Send one to O-Tar announcing that U-Dor brings two prisoners worthy of the observation of the great jeddak,” said U-Dor; ”one because of her extreliness”
”O-Tar sits in council with the lesser chiefs,” replied the lieutenant; ”but the words of U-Dor the dwar shall be carried to hiave instructions to one who sat his thoat behind him
”What manner of creature is the male?” he asked of U-Dor ”It cannot be that both are of one race”
”They were together in the hills south of the city,” explained U-Dor, ”and they say that they are lost and starving”
”The woing in the city of Manator,” and then they spoke of other s of the palace, of the expedition of U-Dor, until thethe prisoners to hih a reat council chamber of O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator, beyond A central aisle led fro at the steps of a reat throne-chair Upon either side of the aisle were ranged rows of highly carved desks and chairs of skeel a hard wood of great beauty Only a few of the desks were occupied--those in the front row, just below the rostrum