A HERO IN KAOL
It was daylight when I was awakened by the sound of stealthy movementnear by.
As I opened my eyes Woola, too, moved and, coming up to his haunches,stared through the intervening brush toward the road, each hairupon his neck stiffly erect.
At first I could see nothing, but presently I caught a glimpse ofa bit of smooth and glossy green moving among the scarlet and purpleand yellow of the vegetation.
Motioning Woola to remain quietly where he was, I crept forward toinvestigate, and from behind the bole of a great tree I saw a longline of the hideous green warriors of the dead sea bottoms hidingin the dense jungle beside the road.
As far as I could see, the silent line of destruction and deathstretched away from the city of Kaol. There could be but oneexplanation. The green men were expecting an exodus of a body ofred troops from the nearest city gate, and they were lying therein ambush to leap upon them.
I owed no fealty to the Jeddak of Kaol, but he was of the same raceof noble red men as my own princess, and I would not stand supinelyby and see his warriors butchered by the cruel and heartless demonsof the waste places of Barsoom.
Cautiously I retraced my steps to where I had left Woola, and warninghim to silence, signaled him to follow me. Making a considerabledetour to avoid the chance of falling into the hands of the greenmen, I came at last to the great wall.
A hundred yards to my right was the gate from which the troopswere evidently expected to issue, but to reach it I must pass theflank of the green warriors within easy sight of them, and, fearingthat my plan to warn the Kaolians might thus be thwarted, I decidedupon hastening toward the left, where another gate a mile awaywould give me ingress to the city.
I knew that the word I brought would prove a splendid passport toKaol, and I must admit that my caution was due more to my ardentdesire to make my way into the city than to avoid a brush with thegreen men. As much as I enjoy a fight, I cannot always indulgemyself, and just now I had more weighty matters to occupy my timethan spilling the blood of strange warriors.
Could I but win beyond the city's wall, there might be opportunityin the confusion and excitement which were sure to follow myannouncement of an invading force of green warriors to find my waywithin the palace of the jeddak, where I was sure Matai Shang andhis party would be quartered.
But scarcely had I taken a hundred steps in the direction of thefarther gate when the sound of marching troops, the clank of metal,and the squealing of thoats just within the city apprised me of thefact that the Kaolians were already moving toward the other gate.
There was no time to be lost. In another moment the gate would beopened and the head of the column pass out upon the death-borderedhighway.
Turning back toward the fateful gate, I ran rapidly along the edgeof the clearing, taking the ground in the mighty leaps that hadfirst made me famous upon Barsoom. Thirty, fifty, a hundred feetat a bound are nothing for the muscles of an athletic Earth manupon Mars.
As I passed the flank of the waiting green men they saw my eyesturned upon them, and in an instant, knowing that all secrecy wasat an end, those nearest me sprang to their feet in an effort tocut me off before I could reach the gate.
At the same instant the mighty portal swung wide and the head ofthe Kaolian column emerged. A dozen green warriors had succeededin reaching a point between me and the gate, but they had but littleidea who it was they had elected to detain.
I did not slacken my speed an iota as I dashed among them, and asthey fell before my blade I could not but recall the happy memoryof those other battles when Tars Tarkas, Jeddak of Thark, mightiestof Martian green men, had stood shoulder to shoulder with me throughlong, hot Martian days, as together we hewed down our enemies untilthe pile of corpses about us rose higher than a tall man's head.
When several pressed me too closely, there before the carved gatewayof Kaol, I leaped above their heads, and fashioning my tacticsafter those of the hideous plant men of Dor, struck down upon myenemies' heads as I passed above them.
From the city the red warriors were rushing toward us, and fromthe jungle the savage horde of green men were coming to meet them.In a moment I was in the very center of as fierce and bloody abattle as I had ever passed through.
These Kaolians are most noble fighters, nor are the green men ofthe equator one whit less warlike than their cold, cruel cousins ofthe temperate zone. There were many times when either side mighthave withdrawn without dishonor and thus ended hostilities, butfrom the mad abandon with which each invariably renewed hostilitiesI soon came to believe that what need not have been more than atrifling skirmish would end only with the complete exterminationof one force or the other.
With the joy of battle once roused within me, I took keen delightin the fray, and that my fighting was noted by the Kaolians wasoften evidenced by the shouts of applause directed at me.
If I sometimes seem to take too great pride in my fighting ability, itmust be remembered that fighting is my vocation. If your vocationbe shoeing horses, or painting pictures, and you can do one orthe other better than your fellows, then you are a fool if you arenot proud of your ability. And so I am very proud that upon twoplanets no greater fighter has ever lived than John Carter, Princeof Helium.
And I outdid myself that day to impress the fact upon the nativesof Kaol, for I wished to win a way into their hearts--and theircity. Nor was I to be disappointed in my desire.
All day we fought, until the road was red with blood and cloggedwith corpses. Back and forth along the slippery highway the tideof battle surged, but never once was the gateway to Kaol really indanger.
There were breathing spells when I had a chance to converse withthe red men beside whom I fought, and once the jeddak, Kulan Tithhimself, laid his hand upon my shoulder and asked my name.
"I am Dotar Sojat," I replied, recalling a name given me by theTharks many years before, from the surnames of the first two oftheir warriors I had killed, which is the custom among them.
"You are a mighty warrior, Dotar Sojat," he replied, "and whenthis day is done I shall speak with you again in the great audiencechamber."
And then the fight surged upon us once more and we were separated,but my heart's desire was attained, and it was with renewed vigorand a joyous soul that I laid about me with my long-sword untilthe last of the green men had had enough and had withdrawn towardtheir distant sea bottom.
Not until the battle was over did I learn why the red troops hadsallied forth that day. It seemed that Kulan Tith was expectinga visit from a mighty jeddak of the north--a powerful and the onlyally of the Kaolians, and it had been his wish to meet his guesta full day's journey from Kaol.
But now the march of the welcoming host was delayed until thefollowing morning, when the troops again set out from Kaol. I hadnot been bidden to the presence of Kulan Tith after the battle,but he had sent an officer to find me and escort me to comfortablequarters in that part of the palace set aside for the officers ofthe royal guard.
There, with Woola, I had spent a comfortable night, and rose muchrefreshed after the arduous labors of the past few days. Woolahad fought with me through the battle of the previous day, true tothe instincts and training of a Martian war dog, great numbers ofwhich are often to be found with the savage green hordes of thedead sea bottoms.
Neither of us had come through the conflict unscathed, but themarvelous, healing salves of Barsoom had sufficed, overnight, tomake us as good as new.
I breakfasted with a number of the Kaolian officers, whom I foundas courteous and delightful hosts as even the nobles of Helium, whoare renowned for their ease of manners and excellence of breeding.The meal was scarcely concluded when a messenger arrived from KulanTith summoning me before him.
As I entered the royal presence the jeddak rose, and stepping fromthe dais which supported his magnificent throne, came forward tomeet me--a mark of distinction that is seldom accorded to otherthan a visiting ruler.
"Kaor, Dotar Sojat!" he greeted
me. "I have summoned you to receivethe grateful thanks of the people of Kaol, for had it not been foryour heroic bravery in daring fate to warn us of the ambuscade wemust surely have fallen into the well-laid trap. Tell me more ofyourself--from what country you come, and what errand brings youto the court of Kulan Tith."
"I am from Hastor," I said, for in truth I had a small palace inthat southern city which lies within the far-flung dominions ofthe Heliumetic nation.
"My presence in the land of Kaol is partly due to accident, myflier being wrecked upon the southern fringe of your great forest.It was while seeking entrance to the city of Kaol that I discoveredthe green horde lying in wait for your troops."
If Kulan Tith wondered what business brought me in a flier to thevery edge of his domain he was good enough not to press me furtherfor an explanation, which I should indeed have had difficulty inrendering.
During my audience with the jeddak another party entered thechamber from behind me, so that I did not see their faces untilKulan Tith stepped past me to greet them, commanding me to followand be presented.
As I turned toward them it was with difficulty that I controlledmy features, for there, listening to Kulan Tith's eulogistic wordsconcerning me, stood my arch-enemies, Matai Shang and Thurid.
"Holy Hekkador of the Holy Therns," the jeddak was saying, "showerthy blessings upon Dotar Sojat, the valorous stranger from distantHastor, whose wondrous heroism and marvelous ferocity saved theday for Kaol yesterday."
Matai Shang stepped forward and laid his hand upon my shoulder.No slightest indication that he recognized me showed upon hiscountenance--my disguise was evidently complete.
He spoke kindly to me and then presented me to Thurid. The black,too, was evidently entirely deceived. Then Kulan Tith regaledthem, much to my amusement, with details of my achievements uponthe field of battle.
The thing that seemed to have impressed him most was my remarkableagility, and time and again he described the wondrous way in whichI had leaped completely over an antagonist, cleaving his skull wideopen with my long-sword as I passed above him.
I thought that I saw Thurid's eyes widen a bit during the narrative,and several times I surprised him gazing intently into my facethrough narrowed lids. Was he commencing to suspect? And thenKulan Tith told of the savage calot that fought beside me, andafter that I saw suspicion in the eyes of Matai Shang--or did Ibut imagine it?
At the close of the audience Kulan Tith announced that he wouldhave me accompany him upon the way to meet his royal guest, andas I departed with an officer who was to procure proper trappingsand a suitable mount for me, both Matai Shang and Thurid seemed mostsincere in professing their pleasure at having had an opportunityto know me. It was with a sigh of relief that I quitted the chamber,convinced that nothing more than a guilty conscience had promptedmy belief that either of my enemies suspected my true identity.
A half-hour later I rode out of the city gate with the column thataccompanied Kulan Tith upon the way to meet his friend and ally.Though my eyes and ears had been wide open during my audience withthe jeddak and my various passages through the palace, I had seenor heard nothing of Dejah Thoris or Thuvia of Ptarth. That theymust be somewhere within the great rambling edifice I was positive,and I should have given much to have found a way to remain behindduring Kulan Tith's absence, that I might search for them.
Toward noon we came in touch with the head of the column we hadset out to meet.
It was a gorgeous train that accompanied the visiting jeddak, andfor miles it stretched along the wide, white road to Kaol. Mountedtroops, their trappings of jewel and metal-incrusted leatherglistening in the sunlight, formed the vanguard of the body, andthen came a thousand gorgeous chariots drawn by huge zitidars.
These low, commodious wagons moved two abreast, and on either sideof them marched solid ranks of mounted warriors, for in the chariotswere the women and children of the royal court. Upon the backof each monster zitidar rode a Martian youth, and the whole scenecarried me back to my first days upon Barsoom, now twenty-two yearsin the past, when I had first beheld the gorgeous spectacle of acaravan of the green horde of Tharks.
Never before today had I seen zitidars in the service of red men.These brutes are huge mastodonian animals that tower to an immenseheight even beside the giant green men and their giant thoats;but when compared to the relatively small red man and his breedof thoats they assume Brobdingnagian proportions that are trulyappalling.
The beasts were hung with jeweled trappings and saddlepads of gaysilk, embroidered in fanciful designs with strings of diamonds,pearls, rubies, emeralds, and the countless unnamed jewels of Mars,while from each chariot rose a dozen standards from which streamers,flags, and pennons fluttered in the breeze.
Just in front of the chariots the visiting jeddak rode alone upona pure white thoat--another unusual sight upon Barsoom--and afterthem came interminable ranks of mounted spearmen, riflemen, andswordsmen. It was indeed a most imposing sight.
Except for the clanking of accouterments and the occasional squealof an angry thoat or the low guttural of a zitidar, the passage ofthe cavalcade was almost noiseless, for neither thoat nor zitidaris a hoofed animal, and the broad tires of the chariots are of anelastic composition, which gives forth no sound.
Now and then the gay laughter of a woman or the chatter of childrencould be heard, for the red Martians are a social, pleasure-lovingpeople--in direct antithesis to the cold and morbid race of greenmen.
The forms and ceremonials connected with the meeting of the twojeddaks consumed an hour, and then we turned and retraced our waytoward the city of Kaol, which the head of the column reached justbefore dark, though it must have been nearly morning before therear guard passed through the gateway.
Fortunately, I was well up toward the head of the column, and afterthe great banquet, which I attended with the officers of the royalguard, I was free to seek repose. There was so much activity andbustle about the palace all during the night with the constantarrival of the noble officers of the visiting jeddak's retinuethat I dared not attempt to prosecute a search for Dejah Thoris,and so, as soon as it was seemly for me to do so, I returned to myquarters.
As I passed along the corridors between the banquet hall and theapartments that had been allotted me, I had a sudden feeling thatI was under surveillance, and, turning quickly in my tracks, caughta glimpse of a figure which darted into an open doorway the instantI wheeled about.
Though I ran quickly back to the spot where the shadower haddisappeared I could find no trace of him, yet in the brief glimpsethat I had caught I could have sworn that I had seen a white facesurmounted by a mass of yellow hair.
The incident gave me considerable food for speculation, since if Iwere right in the conclusion induced by the cursory glimpse I hadhad of the spy, then Matai Shang and Thurid must suspect my identity,and if that were true not even the service I had rendered KulanTith could save me from his religious fanaticism.
But never did vague conjecture or fruitless fears for the futurelie with sufficient weight upon my mind to keep me from my rest,and so tonight I threw myself upon my sleeping silks and furs andpassed at once into dreamless slumber.
Calots are not permitted within the walls of the palace proper,and so I had had to relegate poor Woola to quarters in the stableswhere the royal thoats are kept. He had comfortable, even luxuriousapartments, but I would have given much to have had him with me;and if he had been, the thing which happened that night would nothave come to pass.
I could not have slept over a quarter of an hour when I was suddenlyawakened by the passing of some cold and clammy thing across myforehead. Instantly I sprang to my feet, clutching in the direction Ithought the presence lay. For an instant my hand touched againsthuman flesh, and then, as I lunged headforemost through thedarkness to seize my nocturnal visitor, my foot became entangledin my sleeping silks and I fell sprawling to the floor.
By the time I had resumed my feet and found the button whichcontrolled the ligh
t my caller had disappeared. Careful search ofthe room revealed nothing to explain either the identity or businessof the person who had thus secretly sought me in the dead of night.
That the purpose might be theft I could not believe, since thievesare practically unknown upon Barsoom. Assassination, however, isrampant, but even this could not have been the motive of my stealthyfriend, for he might easily have killed me had he desired.
I had about given up fruitless conjecture and was on the pointof returning to sleep when a dozen Kaolian guardsmen entered myapartment. The officer in charge was one of my genial hosts ofthe morning, but now upon his face was no sign of friendship.
"Kulan Tith commands your presence before him," he said. "Come!"