The Gods of Mars Revoked (33 page)

No
sooner had Carthoris and the others joined me than we commenced the
transportation of our women through the submerged passage to the
mouth of the gangways which lead from the submarine pool at the
temple end of the watery tunnel to the pits of Issus.

Many
trips were required, but at last all stood safely together again at
the beginning of the end of our quest. Five thousand strong we
were, all seasoned fighting-womenwomen of the most warlike race of
the red women of Barsoom.

As
Carthoris alone knew the hidden ways of the tunnels we could not
divide the party and attack the temple at several points at once as
would have been most desirable, and so it was decided that she lead
us all as quickly as possible to a point near the temple's
centre.

As we
were about to leave the pool and enter the corridor, an officer
called my attention to the waters upon which the submarine floated.
At first they seemed to be merely agitated as from the movement of
some great body beneath the surface, and I at once conjectured that
another submarine was rising to the surface in pursuit of us; but
presently it became apparent that the level of the waters was
rising, not with extreme rapidity, but very surely, and that soon
they would overflow the sides of the pool and submerge the floor of
the chamber.

For a
moment I did not fully grasp the terrible import of the slowly
rising water. It was Carthoris who realized the full meaning of the
thing--its cause and the reason for it.

'Haste!' she cried. 'If we delay, we all are lost. The pumps
of Omean have been stopped. They would drown us like rats in a
trap. We must reach the upper levels of the pits in advance of the
flood or we shall never reach them. Come.'

'Lead
the way, Carthoris,' I cried. 'We will follow.'

At my
command, the youth leaped into one of the corridors, and in column
of twos the soldiers followed her in good order, each company
entering the corridor only at the command of its dwar, or
captain.

Before
the last company filed from the chamber the water was ankle deep,
and that the women were nervous was quite evident. Entirely
unaccustomed to water except in quantities sufficient for drinking
and bathing purposes the red Martians instinctively shrank from it
in such formidable depths and menacing activity. That they were
undaunted while it swirled and eddied about their ankles, spoke
well for their bravery and their discipline.

I was
the last to leave the chamber of the submarine, and as I followed
the rear of the column toward the corridor, I moved through water
to my knees. The corridor, too, was flooded to the same depth, for
its floor was on a level with the floor of the chamber from which
it led, nor was there any perceptible rise for many
yards.

The
march of the troops through the corridor was as rapid as was
consistent with the number of women that moved through so narrow a
passage, but it was not ample to permit us to gain appreciably on
the pursuing tide. As the level of the passage rose, so, too, did
the waters rise until it soon became apparent to me, who brought up
the rear, that they were gaining rapidly upon us. I could
understand the reason for this, as with the narrowing expanse of
Omean as the waters rose toward the apex of its dome, the rapidity
of its rise would increase in inverse ratio to the ever-lessening
space to be filled.

Long
ere the last of the column could hope to reach the upper pits which
lay above the danger point I was convinced that the waters would
surge after us in overwhelming volume, and that fully half the
expedition would be snuffed out.

As I
cast about for some means of saving as many as possible of the
doomed women, I saw a diverging corridor which seemed to rise at a
steep angle at my right. The waters were now swirling about my
waist. The women directly before me were quickly becoming
panic-stricken. Something must be done at once or they would rush
forward upon their fellows in a mad stampede that would result in
trampling down hundreds beneath the flood and eventually clogging
the passage beyond any hope of retreat for those in
advance.

Raising my voice to its utmost, I shouted my command to the
dwars ahead of me.

'Call
back the last twenty-five utans,' I shouted. 'Here seems a way of
escape. Turn back and follow me.'

My
orders were obeyed by nearer thirty utans, so that some three
thousand women came about and hastened into the teeth of the flood
to reach the corridor up which I directed them.

As the
first dwar passed in with her utan I cautioned her to listen
closely for my commands, and under no circumstances to venture into
the open, or leave the pits for the temple proper until I should
have come up with her, 'or you know that I died before I could
reach you.'

The
officer saluted and left me. The women filed rapidly past me and
entered the diverging corridor which I hoped would lead to safety.
The water rose breast high. Women stumbled, floundered, and went
down. Many I grasped and set upon their feet again, but alone the
work was greater than I could cope with. Soldiers were being swept
beneath the boiling torrent, never to rise. At length the dwar of
the 10th utan took a stand beside me. She was a valorous soldier,
Gur Tus by name, and together we kept the now thoroughly frightened
troops in the semblance of order and rescued many that would have
drowned otherwise.

Djora
Kantoa, daughter of Kantoa Kan, and a padwar of the fifth utan
joined us when her utan reached the opening through which the women
were fleeing. Thereafter not a woman was lost of all the hundreds
that remained to pass from the main corridor to the
branch.

As the
last utan was filing past us the waters had risen until they surged
about our necks, but we clasped hands and stood our ground until
the last woman had passed to the comparative safety of the new
passageway. Here we found an immediate and steep ascent, so that
within a hundred yards we had reached a point above the
waters.

For a
few minutes we continued rapidly up the steep grade, which I hoped
would soon bring us quickly to the upper pits that let into the
Temple of Issus. But I was to meet with a cruel
disappointment.

Suddenly I heard a cry of 'fire' far ahead, followed almost at
once by cries of terror and the loud commands of dwars and padwars
who were evidently attempting to direct their women away from some
grave danger. At last the report came back to us. 'They have fired
the pits ahead.' 'We are hemmed in by flames in front and flood
behind.' 'Help, Joan Carter; we are suffocating,' and then there
swept back upon us at the rear a wave of dense smoke that sent us,
stumbling and blinded, into a choking retreat.

There
was naught to do other than seek a new avenue of escape. The fire
and smoke were to be feared a thousand times over the water, and so
I seized upon the first gallery which led out of and up from the
suffocating smoke that was engulfing us.

Again
I stood to one side while the soldiers hastened through on the new
way. Some two thousand must have passed at a rapid run, when the
stream ceased, but I was not sure that all had been rescued who had
not passed the point of origin of the flames, and so to assure
myself that no poor devil was left behind to die a horrible death,
unsuccoured, I ran quickly up the gallery in the direction of the
flames which I could now see burning with a dull glow far
ahead.

It was
hot and stifling work, but at last I reached a point where the fire
lit up the corridor sufficiently for me to see that no soldier of
Helium lay between me and the conflagration--what was in it or upon
the far side I could not know, nor could any woman have passed
through that seething hell of chemicals and lived to
learn.

Having
satisfied my sense of duty, I turned and ran rapidly back to the
corridor through which my women had passed. To my horror, however,
I found that my retreat in this direction had been blocked--across
the mouth of the corridor stood a massive steel grating that had
evidently been lowered from its resting-place above for the purpose
of effectually cutting off my escape.

That
our principal movements were known to the First Born I could not
have doubted, in view of the attack of the fleet upon us the day
before, nor could the stopping of the pumps of Omean at the
psychological moment have been due to chance, nor the starting of a
chemical combustion within the one corridor through which we were
advancing upon the Temple of Issus been due to aught than
well-calculated design.

And
now the dropping of the steel gate to pen me effectually between
fire and flood seemed to indicate that invisible eyes were upon us
at every moment. What chance had I, then, to rescue Dejar Thoris
were I to be compelled to fight foes who never showed themselves. A
thousand times I berated myself for being drawn into such a trap as
I might have known these pits easily could be. Now I saw that it
would have been much better to have kept our force intact and made
a concerted attack upon the temple from the valley side, trusting
to chance and our great fighting ability to have overwhelmed the
First Born and compelled the safe delivery of Dejar Thoris to
me.

The
smoke from the fire was forcing me further and further back down
the corridor toward the waters which I could hear surging through
the darkness. With my women had gone the last torch, nor was this
corridor lighted by the radiance of phosphorescent rock as were
those of the lower levels. It was this fact that assured me that I
was not far from the upper pits which lie directly beneath the
temple.

Finally I felt the lapping waters about my feet. The smoke was
thick behind me. My suffering was intense. There seemed but one
thing to do, and that to choose the easier death which confronted
me, and so I moved on down the corridor until the cold waters of
Omean closed about me, and I swam on through utter blackness
toward--what?

The
instinct of self-preservation is strong even when one, unafraid and
in the possession of her highest reasoning faculties, knows that
death--positive and unalterable--lies just ahead. And so I swam
slowly on, waiting for my head to touch the top of the corridor,
which would mean that I had reached the limit of my flight and the
point where I must sink for ever to an unmarked grave.

But to
my surprise I ran against a blank wall before I reached a point
where the waters came to the roof of the corridor. Could I be
mistaken? I felt around. No, I had come to the main corridor, and
still there was a breathing space between the surface of the water
and the rocky ceiling above. And then I turned up the main corridor
in the direction that Carthoris and the head of the column had
passed a half-hour before. On and on I swam, my heart growing
lighter at every stroke, for I knew that I was approaching closer
and closer to the point where there would be no chance that the
waters ahead could be deeper than they were about me. I was
positive that I must soon feel the solid floor beneath my feet
again and that once more my chance would come to reach the Temple
of Issus and the side of the fair prisoner who languished
there.

But
even as hope was at its highest I felt the sudden shock of contact
as my head struck the rocks above. The worst, then, had come to me.
I had reached one of those rare places where a Martian tunnel dips
suddenly to a lower level. Somewhere beyond I knew that it rose
again, but of what value was that to me, since I did not know how
great the distance that it maintained a level entirely beneath the
surface of the water!

There
was but a single forlorn hope, and I took it. Filling my lungs with
air, I dived beneath the surface and swam through the inky, icy
blackness on and on along the submerged gallery. Time and time
again I rose with upstretched hand, only to feel the disappointing
rocks close above me.

Not
for much longer would my lungs withstand the strain upon them. I
felt that I must soon succumb, nor was there any retreating now
that I had gone this far. I knew positively that I could never
endure to retrace my path now to the point from which I had felt
the waters close above my head. Death stared me in the face, nor
ever can I recall a time that I so distinctly felt the icy breath
from her dead lips upon my brow.

One
more frantic effort I made with my fast ebbing strength. Weakly I
rose for the last time--my tortured lungs gasped for the breath
that would fill them with a strange and numbing element, but
instead I felt the revivifying breath of life-giving air surge
through my starving nostrils into my dying lungs. I was
saved.

A few
more strokes brought me to a point where my feet touched the floor,
and soon thereafter I was above the water level entirely, and
racing like mad along the corridor searching for the first doorway
that would lead me to Issus. If I could not have Dejar Thoris again
I was at least determined to avenge his death, nor would any life
satisfy me other than that of the fiend incarnate who was the cause
of such immeasurable suffering upon Barsoom.

Sooner
than I had expected I came to what appeared to me to be a sudden
exit into the temple above. It was at the right side of the
corridor, which ran on, probably, to other entrances to the pile
above.