Thuvia, maid of Mars
to slip down the sinking marble floor toward an unknown fate.
Then she had not chidden him for the use of that familiar salutation,
nor did she chide him now, though she was promised to another. She
wondered at herself—flushing at her own turpitude; for upon Barsoom it
is a shameful thing for a woman to listen to those two words from
another than her husband or her betrothed.
Carthoris saw her flush of mortification, and in an instant regretted
his words. There was but a moment before the green warriors would be
upon them.
“Forgive me!” said the man in a low voice. “Let my great love be my
excuse—that, and the belief that I have but a moment more of life,” and
with the words he turned to meet the foremost of the green warriors.
The fellow was charging with couched spear, but Carthoris leaped to one
side, and as the great thoat and its rider hurtled harmlessly past him
he swung his long-sword in a mighty cut that clove the green carcass in
twain.
At the same moment Kar Komak leaped with bare hands clawing at the leg
of another of the huge riders; the balance of the horde raced in to
close quarters, dismounting the better to wield their favourite
long-swords; the Dusarian fliers touched the soft carpet of the
ochre-clad sea-bottom, disgorging fifty fighting men from their bowels;
and into the swirling sea of cutting, slashing swords sprang Komal, the
great banth.
CHAPTER XI.
GREEN MEN AND WHITE APES
A Torquasian sword smote a glancing blow across the forehead of
Carthoris. He had a fleeting vision of soft arms about his neck, and
warm lips close to his before he lost consciousness.
How long he lay there senseless he could not guess; but when he opened
his eyes again he was alone, except for the bodies of the dead green
men and Dusarians, and the carcass of a great banth that lay half
across his own.
Thuvia was gone, nor was the body of Kar Komak among the dead.
Weak from loss of blood, Carthoris made his way slowly toward Aaanthor,
reaching its outskirts at dark.
He wanted water more than any other thing, and so he kept on up a broad
avenue toward the great central plaza, where he knew the precious fluid
was to be found in a half-ruined building opposite the great palace of
the ancient jeddak, who once had ruled this mighty city.
Disheartened and discouraged by the strange sequence of events that
seemed fore-ordained to thwart his every attempt to serve the Princess
of Ptarth, he paid little or no attention to his surroundings, moving
through the deserted city as though no great white apes lurked in the
black shadows of the mystery-haunted piles that flanked the broad
avenues and the great plaza.
But if Carthoris was careless of his surroundings, not so other eyes
that watched his entrance into the plaza, and followed his slow
footsteps toward the marble pile that housed the tiny, half-choked
spring whose water one might gain only by scratching a deep hole in the
red sand that covered it.
And as the Heliumite entered the small building a dozen mighty,
grotesque figures emerged from the doorway of the palace to speed
noiselessly across the plaza toward him.
For half an hour Carthoris remained in the building, digging for water
and gaining the few much-needed drops which were the fruits of his
labour. Then he rose and slowly left the structure. Scarce had he
stepped beyond the threshold than twelve Torquasian warriors leaped
upon him.
No time then to draw long-sword; but swift from his harness flew his
long, slim dagger, and as he went down beneath them more than a single
green heart ceased beating at the bite of that keen point.
Then they overpowered him and took his weapons away; but only nine of
the twelve warriors who had crossed the plaza returned with their
prize.
They dragged their prisoner roughly to the palace pits, where in utter
darkness they chained him with rusty links to the solid masonry of the
wall.
“To-morrow Thar Ban will speak with you,” they said. “Now he sleeps.
But great will be his pleasure when he learns who has wandered amongst
us—and great will be the pleasure of Hortan Gur when Thar Ban drags
before him the mad fool who dared prick the great jeddak with his
sword.”
Then they left him to the silence and the darkness.
For what seemed hours Carthoris squatted upon the stone floor of his
prison, his back against the wall in which was sunk the heavy eye-bolt
that secured the chain which held him.
Then, from out of the mysterious blackness before him, there came to
his ears the sound of naked feet moving stealthily upon
stone—approaching nearer and nearer to where he lay, unarmed and
defenceless.
Minutes passed—minutes that seemed hours—during which time periods of
sepulchral silence would be followed by a repetition of the uncanny
scraping of naked feet slinking warily upon him.
At last he heard a sudden rush of unshod soles across the empty
blackness, and at a little distance a scuffling sound, heavy breathing,
and once what he thought the muttered imprecation of a man battling
against great odds. Then the clanging of a chain, and a noise as of the
snapping back against stone of a broken link.
Again came silence. But for a moment only. Now he heard once more the
soft feet approaching him. He thought that he discerned wicked eyes
gleaming fearfully at him through the darkness. He knew that he could
hear the heavy breathing of powerful lungs.
Then came the rush of many feet toward him, and the _things_ were upon
him.
Hands terminating in manlike fingers clutched at his throat and arms
and legs. Hairy bodies strained and struggled against his own smooth
hide as he battled in grim silence against these horrid foemen in the
darkness of the pits of ancient Aaanthor.
Thewed like some giant god was Carthoris of Helium, yet in the clutches
of these unseen creatures of the pit’s Stygian night he was helpless as
a frail woman.
Yet he battled on, striking futile blows against great, hispid breasts
he could not see; feeling thick, squat throats beneath his fingers; the
drool of saliva upon his cheek, and hot, foul breath in his nostrils.
Fangs, too, mighty fangs, he knew were close, and why they did not sink
into his flesh he could not guess.
At last he became aware of the mighty surging of a number of his
antagonists back and forth upon the great chain that held him, and
presently came the same sound that he had heard at a little distance
from him a short time before he had been attacked—his chain had parted
and the broken end snapped back against the stone wall.
Now he was seized upon either side and dragged at a rapid pace through
the dark corridors—toward what fate he could not even guess.
At first he had thought his foes might be of the tribe of Torquas, but
their hairy bodies belied that belief. Now he was at last quite sure of
their identity, though why they had not killed and devoured him at once
he could not imagine.
After half an hour or more of rapid racing through the underground
passages that are a distinguishing feature of all Barsoomian cities,
modern as well as ancient, his captors suddenly emerged into the
moonlight of a courtyard, far from the central plaza.
Immediately Carthoris saw that he was in the power of a tribe of the
great white apes of Barsoom. All that had caused him doubt before as to
the identity of his attackers was the hairiness of their breasts, for
the white apes are entirely hairless except for a great shock bristling
from their heads.
Now he saw the cause of that which had deceived him—across the chest of
each of them were strips of hairy hide, usually of banth, in imitation
of the harness of the green warriors who so often camped at their
deserted city.
Carthoris had read of the existence of tribes of apes that seemed to be
progressing slowly toward higher standards of intelligence. Into the
hands of such, he realized, he had fallen; but—what were their
intentions toward him?
As he glanced about the courtyard, he saw fully fifty of the hideous
beasts, squatting on their haunches, and at a little distance from him
another human being, closely guarded.
As his eyes met those of his fellow-captive a smile lit the other’s
face, and: “Kaor, red man!” burst from his lips. It was Kar Komak, the
bowman.
“Kaor!” cried Carthoris, in response. “How came you here, and what
befell the princess?”
“Red men like yourself descended in mighty ships that sailed the air,
even as the great ships of my distant day sailed the five seas,”
replied Kar Komak. “They fought with the green men of Torquas. They
slew Komal, god of Lothar. I thought they were your friends, and I was
glad when finally those of them who survived the battle carried the red
girl to one of the ships and sailed away with her into the safety of
the high air.
“Then the green men seized me, and carried me to a great, empty city,
where they chained me to a wall in a black pit. Afterward came these
and dragged me hither. And what of you, red man?”
Carthoris related all that had befallen him, and as the two men talked
the great apes squatted about them watching them intently.
“What are we to do now?” asked the bowman.
“Our case looks rather hopeless,” replied Carthoris ruefully. “These
creatures are born man-eaters. Why they have not already devoured us I
cannot imagine—there!” he whispered. “See? The end is coming.”
Kar Komak looked in the direction Carthoris indicated to see a huge ape
advancing with a mighty bludgeon.
“It is thus they like best to kill their prey,” said Carthoris.
“Must we die without a struggle?” asked Kar Komak.
“Not I,” replied Carthoris, “though I know how futile our best defence
must be against these mighty brutes! Oh, for a long-sword!”
“Or a good bow,” added Kar Komak, “and a utan of bowmen.”
At the words Carthoris half sprang to his feet, only to be dragged
roughly down by his guard.
“Kar Komak!” he cried. “Why cannot you do what Tario and Jav did? They
had no bowmen other than those of their own creation. You must know the
secret of their power. Call forth your own utan, Kar Komak!”
The Lotharian looked at Carthoris in wide-eyed astonishment as the full
purport of the suggestion bore in upon his understanding.
“Why not?” he murmured.
The savage ape bearing the mighty bludgeon was slinking toward
Carthoris. The Heliumite’s fingers were working as he kept his eyes
upon his executioner. Kar Komak bent his gaze penetratingly upon the
apes. The effort of his mind was evidenced in the sweat upon his
contracted brows.
The creature that was to slay the red man was almost within arm’s reach
of his prey when Carthoris heard a hoarse shout from the opposite side
of the courtyard. In common with the squatting apes and the demon with
the club he turned in the direction of the sound, to see a company of
sturdy bowmen rushing from the doorway of a near-by building.
With screams of rage the apes leaped to their feet to meet the charge.
A volley of arrows met them half-way, sending a dozen rolling lifeless
to the ground. Then the apes closed with their adversaries. All their
attention was occupied by the attackers—even the guard had deserted the
prisoners to join in the battle.
“Come!” whispered Kar Komak. “Now may we escape while their attention
is diverted from us by my bowmen.”
“And leave those brave fellows leaderless?” cried Carthoris, whose
loyal nature revolted at the merest suggestion of such a thing.
Kar Komak laughed.
“You forget,” he said, “that they are but thin air—figments of my
brain. They will vanish, unscathed, when we have no further need for
them. Praised be your first ancestor, redman, that you thought of this
chance in time! It would never have occurred to me to imagine that I