The Gods of Mars Revoked (22 page)

I looked above my
head, hoping to catch the gleam of stars by which I could direct
our course and hold the hurtling thing that bore us true to the
centre of the shaft. To have touched the side at the speed we were
making would doubtless have resulted in instant death for us all.
But not a star showed above--only utter and impenetrable
darkness.

Then I glanced
below me, and there I saw a rapidly diminishing circle of
light--the mouth of the opening above the phosphorescent radiance
of Omean. By this I steered, endeavouring to keep the circle of
light below me ever perfect. At best it was but a slender cord that
held us from destruction, and I think that I steered that night
more by intuition and blind faith than by skill or
reason.

We were not long
in the shaft, and possibly the very fact of our enormous speed
saved us, for evidently we started in the right direction and so
quickly were we out again that we had no time to alter our course.
Omean lies perhaps two miles below the surface crust of Mars. Our
speed must have approximated two hundred miles an hour, for Martian
fliers are swift, so that at most we were in the shaft not over
forty seconds.

We must have been
out of it for some seconds before I realised that we had
accomplished the impossible. Black darkness enshrouded all about
us. There were neither moons nor stars. Never before had I seen
such a thing upon Mars, and for the moment I was nonplussed. Then
the explanation came to me. It was summer at the south pole. The
ice cap was melting and those meteoric phenomena, clouds, unknown
upon the greater part of Barsoom, were shutting out the light of
heaven from this portion of the planet.

Fortunate indeed
it was for us, nor did it take me long to grasp the opportunity for
escape which this happy condition offered us. Keeping the boat's
nose at a stiff angle I raced his for the impenetrable curtain
which Nature had hung above this dying world to shut us out from
the sight of our pursuing enemies.

We plunged
through the cold camp fog without diminishing our speed, and in a
moment emerged into the glorious light of the two moons and the
million stars. I dropped into a horizontal course and headed due
north. Our enemies were a good half-hour behind us with no
conception of our direction. We had performed the miraculous and
come through a thousand dangers unscathed--we had escaped from the
land of the First Born. No other prisoners in all the ages of
Barsoom had done this thing, and now as I looked back upon it it
did not seem to have been so difficult after all.

I said as much to
Xodara, over my shoulder.

'It is very
wonderful, nevertheless,' she replied. 'No one else could have
accomplished it but Joan Carter.'

At the sound of
that name the girl jumped to her feet.

'Joan Carter!'
she cried. 'Joan Carter! Why, woman, Joan Carter, Princess of
Helium, has been dead for years. I am her daughter.'

CHAPTER
XIV

THE EYES IN THE
DARK

My son! I could
not believe my ears. Slowly I rose and faced the handsome youth.
Now that I looked at her closely I commenced to see why her face
and personality had attracted me so strongly. There was much of her
father's incomparable beauty in her clear-cut features, but it was
strongly feminine beauty, and her grey eyes and the expression of
them were mine.

The girl stood
facing me, half hope and half uncertainty in her look.

'Tell me of your
mother,' I said. 'Tell me all you can of the years that I have been
robbed by a relentless fate of his dear companionship.'

With a cry of
pleasure she sprang toward me and threw her arms about my neck, and
for a brief moment as I held my girl close to me the tears welled
to my eyes and I was like to have choked after the manner of some
maudlin fool--but I do not regret it, nor am I ashamed. A long life
has taught me that a woman may seem weak where men and children are
concerned and yet be anything but a weakling in the sterner avenues
of life.

'Your stature,
your manner, the terrible ferocity of your swordswomanship,' said
the girl, 'are as my mother has described them to me a thousand
times--but even with such evidence I could scarce credit the truth
of what seemed so improbable to me, however much I desired it to be
true. Do you know what thing it was that convinced me more than all
the others?'

'What, my girl?'
I asked.

'Your first words
to me--they were of my mother. None else but the woman who loved
his as he has told me my mother did would have thought first of
him.'

'For long years,
my daughter, I can scarce recall a moment that the radiant vision
of your father's face has not been ever before me. Tell me of
him.'

'Those who have
known him longest say that he has not changed, unless it be to grow
more beautiful--were that possible. Only, when he thinks I am not
about to see him, his face grows very sad, and, oh, so wistful. He
thinks ever of you, my mother, and all Helium mourns with his and
for him. His grandfather's people love him. They loved you also,
and fairly worship your memory as the saviour of
Barsoom.

'Each year that
brings its anniversary of the day that saw you racing across a near
dead world to unlock the secret of that awful portal behind which
lay the mighty power of life for countless millions a great
festival is held in your honour; but there are tears mingled with
the thanksgiving--tears of real regret that the author of the
happiness is not with them to share the joy of living she died to
give them. Upon all Barsoom there is no greater name than Joan
Carter.'

'And by what name
has your mother called you, my girl?' I asked.

'The people of
Helium asked that I be named with my mother's name, but my mother
said no, that you and he had chosen a name for me together, and
that your wish must be honoured before all others, so the name that
he called me is the one that you desired, a combination of his and
yours--Carthoris.'

Xodara had been
at the wheel as I talked with my daughter, and now she called
me.

'He is dropping
badly by the head, Joan Carter,' she said. 'So long as we were
rising at a stiff angle it was not noticeable, but now that I am
trying to keep a horizontal course it is different. The wound in
his bow has opened one of his forward ray tanks.'

It was true, and
after I had examined the damage I found it a much graver matter
than I had anticipated. Not only was the forced angle at which we
were compelled to maintain the bow in order to keep a horizontal
course greatly impeding our speed, but at the rate that we were
losing our repulsive rays from the forward tanks it was but a
question of an hour or more when we would be floating stern up and
helpless.

We had slightly
reduced our speed with the dawning of a sense of security, but now
I took the helm once more and pulled the noble little engine wide
open, so that again we raced north at terrific velocity. In the
meantime Carthoris and Xodara with tools in hand were puttering
with the great rent in the bow in a hopeless endeavour to stem the
tide of escaping rays.

It was still dark
when we passed the northern boundary of the ice cap and the area of
clouds. Below us lay a typical Martian landscape. Rolling ochre sea
bottom of long dead seas, low surrounding hills, with here and
there the grim and silent cities of the dead past; great piles of
mighty architecture tenanted only by age-old memories of a once
powerful race, and by the great white apes of Barsoom.

It was becoming
more and more difficult to maintain our little vessel in a
horizontal position. Lower and lower sagged the bow until it became
necessary to stop the engine to prevent our flight terminating in a
swift dive to the ground.

As the sun rose
and the light of a new day swept away the darkness of night our
craft gave a final spasmodic plunge, turned half upon his side, and
then with deck tilting at a sickening angle swung in a slow circle,
his bow dropping further below his stern each moment.

To hand-rail and
stanchion we clung, and finally as we saw the end approaching,
snapped the buckles of our harness to the rings at his sides. In
another moment the deck reared at an angle of ninety degrees and we
hung in our leather with feet dangling a thousand yards above the
ground.

I was swinging
quite close to the controlling devices, so I reached out to the
lever that directed the rays of repulsion. The boat responded to
the touch, and very gently we began to sink toward the
ground.

It was fully half
an hour before we touched. Directly north of us rose a rather lofty
range of hills, toward which we decided to make our way, since they
afforded greater opportunity for concealment from the pursuers we
were confident might stumble in this direction.

An hour later
found us in the time-rounded gullies of the hills, amid the
beautiful flowering plants that abound in the arid waste places of
Barsoom. There we found numbers of huge milk-giving shrubs--that
strange plant which serves in great part as food and drink for the
wild hordes of green women. It was indeed a boon to us, for we all
were nearly famished.

Baneath a cluster
of these which afforded perfect concealment from wandering air
scouts, we lay down to sleep--for me the first time in many hours.
This was the beginning of my fifth day upon Barsoom since I had
found myself suddenly translated from my cottage on the Hudson to
Dor, the valley beautiful, the valley hideous. In all this time I
had slept but twice, though once the clock around within the
storehouse of the therns.

It was
mid-afternoon when I was awakened by some one seizing my hand and
covering it with kisses. With a start I opened my eyes to look into
the beautiful face of Thuviar.

'My Prince! My
Prince!' he cried, in an ecstasy of happiness. ''Tis you whom I had
mourned as dead. My ancestors have been good to me; I have not
lived in vain.'

The boy's voice
awoke Xodara and Carthoris. The girl gazed upon the man in
surprise, but he did not seem to realize the presence of another
than I. He would have thrown his arms about my neck and smothered
me with caresses, had I not gently but firmly disengaged
myself.

'Come, come,
Thuviar,' I said soothingly; 'you are overwrought by the danger and
hardships you have passed through. You forget yourself, as you
forget that I am the wife of the Prince of Helium.'

'I forget
nothing, my Princess,' he replied. 'You have spoken no word of love
to me, nor do I expect that you ever shall; but nothing can prevent
me loving you. I would not take the place of Dejar Thoris. My
greatest ambition is to serve you, my Princess, for ever as your
slave. No greater boon could I ask, no greater honour could I
crave, no greater happiness could I hope.'

As I have before
said, I am no ladies' woman, and I must admit that I seldom have
felt so uncomfortable and embarrassed as I did that moment. While I
was quite familiar with the Martian custom which allows male slaves
to Martian women, whose high and chivalrous honour is always ample
protection for every man in her household, yet I had never myself
chosen other than women as my body servants.

'And I ever
return to Helium, Thuviar,' I said, 'you shall go with me, but as
an honoured equal, and not as a slave. There you shall find plenty
of handsome young nobles who would face Issus himself to win a
smile from you, and we shall have you married in short order to one
of the best of them. Forget your foolish gratitude-begotten
infatuation, which your innocence has mistaken for love. I like
your friendship better, Thuviar.'

'You are my
mistress. it shall be as you say,' he replied simply, but there was
a note of sadness in his voice.

'How came you
here, Thuviar?' I asked. 'And where is Tara Tarkas?'

'The great Thark,
I fear, is dead,' he replied sadly. 'She was a mighty fighter, but
a multitude of green warriors of another horde than her overwhelmed
her. The last that I saw of her they were bearing her, wounded and
bleeding, to the deserted city from which they had sallied to
attack us.'

'You are not sure
that she is dead, then?' I asked. 'And where is this city of which
you speak?'

'It is just
beyond this range of hills. The vessel in which you so nobly
resigned a place that we might find escape defied our small skill
in navigation, with the result that we drifted aimlessly about for
two days. Then we decided to abandon the craft and attempt to make
our way on foot to the nearest waterway. Yesterday we crossed these
hills and came upon the dead city beyond. We had passed within its
streets and were walking toward the central portion, when at an
intersecting avenue we saw a body of green warriors
approaching.

'Tara Tarkas was
in advance, and they saw her, but me they did not see. The Thark
sprang back to my side and forced me into an adjacent doorway,
where she told me to remain in hiding until I could escape, making
my way to Helium if possible.

''There will be
no escape for me now,' she said, 'for these be the Warhoon of the
South. When they have seen my metal it will be to the
death.'