The Gods of Mars, Edgar Rice Burroughs [good ebook reader TXT] 📗

a torch in the hand of one of a party of four green warriors, who were coming rapidly down the corridor toward me. They had not yet seen me, and so I lost no time in slipping into the first intersecting corridor that I could find. This time, however, I did not advance so far away from the main corridor as on the other occasion that had resulted in my losing Tars Tarkas and his guards.

The party came rapidly toward the opening of the passageway in which I crouched against the wall. As they passed by I breathed a sigh of relief. I had not been discovered, and, best of all, the party was the same that I had followed into the pits. It consisted of Tars Tarkas and his three guards.

I fell in behind them and soon we were at the cell in which the great Thark had been chained. Two of the warriors remained without while the man with the keys entered with the Thark to fasten his irons upon him once more. The two outside started to stroll slowly in the direction of the spiral runway which led to the floors above, and in a moment were lost to view beyond a turn in the corridor.

The torch had been stuck in a socket beside the door, so that its rays illuminated both the corridor and the cell at the same time. As I saw the two warriors disappear I approached the entrance to the cell, with a well-defined plan already formulated.

While I disliked the thought of carrying out the thing that I had decided upon, there seemed no alternative if Tars Tarkas and I were to go back together to my little camp in the hills.

Keeping near the wall, I came quite close to the door to Tars Tarkas’ cell, and there I stood with my long-sword above my head, grasped with both hands, that I might bring it down in one quick cut upon the skull of the jailer as he emerged.

I dislike to dwell upon what followed after I heard the footsteps of the man as he approached the doorway. It is enough that within another minute or two, Tars Tarkas, wearing the metal of a Warhoon chief, was hurrying down the corridor toward the spiral runway, bearing the Warhoon’s torch to light his way. A dozen paces behind him followed John Carter, Prince of Helium.

The two companions of the man who lay now beside the door of the cell that had been Tars Tarkas’ had just started to ascend the runway as the Thark came in view.

“Why so long, Tan Gama?” cried one of the men.

“I had trouble with a lock,” replied Tars Tarkas. “And now I find that I have left my short-sword in the Thark’s cell. Go you on, I’ll return and fetch it.”

“As you will, Tan Gama,” replied he who had before spoken. “We shall see you above directly.”

“Yes,” replied Tars Tarkas, and turned as though to retrace his steps to the cell, but he only waited until the two had disappeared at the floor above. Then I joined him, we extinguished the torch, and together we crept toward the spiral incline that led to the upper floors of the building.

At the first floor we found that the hallway ran but halfway through, necessitating the crossing of a rear room full of green folk, ere we could reach the inner courtyard, so there was but one thing left for us to do, and that was to gain the second floor and the hallway through which I had traversed the length of the building.

Cautiously we ascended. We could hear the sounds of conversation coming from the room above, but the hall still was unlighted, nor was anyone in sight as we gained the top of the runway. Together we threaded the long hall and reached the balcony overlooking the courtyard, without being detected.

At our right was the window letting into the room in which I had seen Tan Gama and the other warriors as they started to Tars Tarkas’ cell earlier in the evening. His companions had returned here, and we now overheard a portion of their conversation.

“What can be detaining Tan Gama?” asked one.

“He certainly could not be all this time fetching his short-sword from the Thark’s cell,” spoke another.

“His short-sword?” asked a woman. “What mean you?”

“Tan Gama left his short-sword in the Thark’s cell,” explained the first speaker, “and left us at the runway, to return and get it.”

“Tan Gama wore no short-sword this night,” said the woman. “It was broken in today’s battle with the Thark, and Tan Gama gave it to me to repair. See, I have it here,” and as she spoke she drew Tan Gama’s short-sword from beneath her sleeping silks and furs.

The warriors sprang to their feet.

“There is something amiss here,” cried one.

“ ’Tis even what I myself thought when Tan Gama left us at the runway,” said another. “Methought then that his voice sounded strangely.”

“Come! let us hasten to the pits.”

We waited to hear no more. Slinging my harness into a long single strap, I lowered Tars Tarkas to the courtyard beneath, and an instant later dropped to his side.

We had spoken scarcely a dozen words since I had felled Tan Gama at the cell door and seen in the torch’s light the expression of utter bewilderment upon the great Thark’s face.

“By this time,” he had said, “I should have learned to wonder at nothing which John Carter accomplishes.” That was all. He did not need to tell me that he appreciated the friendship which had prompted me to risk my life to rescue him, nor did he need to say that he was glad to see me.

This fierce green warrior had been the first to greet me that day, now twenty years gone, which had witnessed my first advent upon Mars. He had met me with levelled spear and cruel hatred in his heart as he charged down upon me, bending low at the