The Chessmen of Mars

  CHAPTER X

  ENTRAPPED

  Turan the panthan approached the strange city under cover of thedarkness. He entertained little hope of finding either food or wateroutside the wall, but he would try and then, if he failed, he wouldattempt to make his way into the city, for Tara of Helium must havesustenance and have it soon. He saw that the walls were poorlysentineled, but they were sufficiently high to render an attempt toscale them foredoomed to failure. Taking advantage of underbrush andtrees, Turan managed to reach the base of the wall without detection.Silently he moved north past the gateway which was closed by a massivegate which effectively barred even the slightest glimpse within thecity beyond. It was Turan's hope to find upon the north side of thecity away from the hills a level plain where grew the crops of theinhabitants, and here too water from their irrigating system, butthough he traveled far along that seemingly interminable wall he foundno fields nor any water. He searched also for some means of ingress tothe city, yet here, too, failure was his only reward, and now as hewent keen eyes watched him from above and a silent stalker kept pacewith him for a time upon the summit of the wall; but presently theshadower descended to the pavement within and hurrying swiftly racedahead of the stranger without.

  He came presently to a small gate beside which was a low building andbefore the doorway of the building a warrior standing guard. He spoke afew quick words to the warrior and then entered the building only toreturn almost immediately to the street, followed by fully fortywarriors. Cautiously opening the gate the fellow peered carefully alongthe wall upon the outside in the direction from which he had come.Evidently satisfied, he issued a few words of instruction to thosebehind him, whereupon half the warriors returned to the interior of thebuilding, while the other half followed the man stealthily through thegateway where they crouched low among the shrubbery in a half circlejust north of the gateway which they had left open. Here they waited inutter silence, nor had they long to wait before Turan the panthan camecautiously along the base of the wall. To the very gate he came andwhen he found it and that it was open he paused for a moment,listening; then he approached and looked within. Assured that there wasnone within sight to apprehend him he stepped through the gateway intothe city.

  He found himself in a narrow street that paralleled the wall. Upon theopposite side rose buildings of an architecture unknown to him, yetstrangely beautiful. While the buildings were packed closely togetherthere seemed to be no two alike and their fronts were of all shapes andheights and of many hues. The skyline was broken by spire and dome andminaret and tall, slender towers, while the walls supported many abalcony and in the soft light of Cluros, the farther moon, now low inthe west, he saw, to his surprise and consternation, the figures ofpeople upon the balconies. Directly opposite him were two women and aman. They sat leaning upon the rail of the balcony looking, apparently,directly at him; but if they saw him they gave no sign.

  Turan hesitated a moment in the face of almost certain discovery andthen, assured that they must take him for one of their own people, hemoved boldly into the avenue. Having no idea of the direction in whichhe might best hope to find what he sought, and not wishing to arousesuspicion by further hesitation, he turned to the left and steppedbriskly along the pavement with the intention of placing himself asquickly as possible beyond the observation of those nocturnal watchers.He knew that the night must be far spent; and so he could not butwonder why people should sit upon their balconies when they should havebeen asleep among their silks and furs. At first he had thought themthe late guests of some convivial host; but the windows behind themwere shrouded in darkness and utter quiet prevailed, quite upsettingsuch a theory. And as he proceeded he passed many another group sittingsilently upon other balconies. They paid no attention to him, seemingnot even to note his passing. Some leaned with a single elbow upon therail, their chins resting in their palms; others leaned upon both armsacross the balcony, looking down into the street, while several that hesaw held musical instruments in their hands, but their fingers movednot upon the strings.

  And then Turan came to a point where the avenue turned to the right, toskirt a building that jutted from the inside of the city wall, and ashe rounded the corner he came full upon two warriors standing uponeither side of the entrance to a building upon his right. It wasimpossible for them not to be aware of his presence, yet neither moved,nor gave other evidence that they had seen him. He stood there waiting,his hand upon the hilt of his long-sword, but they neither challengednor halted him. Could it be that these also thought him one of theirown kind? Indeed upon no other grounds could he explain their inaction.

  As Turan had passed through the gateway into the city and taken hisunhindered way along the avenue, twenty warriors had entered the cityand closed the gate behind them, and then one had taken to the wall andfollowed along its summit in the rear of Turan, and another hadfollowed him along the avenue, while a third had crossed the street andentered one of the buildings upon the opposite side.

  The balance of them, with the exception of a single sentinel beside thegate, had re-entered the building from which they had been summoned.They were well built, strapping, painted fellows, their naked figurescovered now by gorgeous robes against the chill of night. As they spokeof the stranger they laughed at the ease with which they had trickedhim, and were still laughing as they threw themselves upon theirsleeping silks and furs to resume their broken slumber. It was evidentthat they constituted a guard detailed for the gate beside which theyslept, and it was equally evident that the gates were guarded and thecity watched much more carefully than Turan had believed. Chagrinedindeed had been the Jed of Gathol had he dreamed that he was being soneatly tricked.

  As Turan proceeded along the avenue he passed other sentries besideother doors but now he gave them small heed, since they neitherchallenged nor otherwise outwardly noted his passing; but while atnearly every turn of the erratic avenue he passed one or more of thesesilent sentinels he could not guess that he had passed one of them manytimes and that his every move was watched by silent, clever stalkers.Scarce had he passed a certain one of these rigid guardsmen before thefellow awoke to sudden life, bounded across the avenue, entered anarrow opening in the outer wall where he swiftly followed a corridorbuilt within the wall itself until presently he emerged a littledistance ahead of Turan, where he assumed the stiff and silent attitudeof a soldier upon guard. Nor did Turan know that a second followed inthe shadows of the buildings behind him, nor of the third who hastenedahead of him upon some urgent mission.

  And so the panthan moved through the silent streets of the strange cityin search of food and drink for the woman he loved. Men and womenlooked down upon him from shadowy balconies, but spoke not; andsentinels saw him pass and did not challenge. Presently from along theavenue before him came the familiar sound of clanking accouterments,the herald of marching warriors, and almost simultaneously he saw uponhis right an open doorway dimly lighted from within. It was the onlyavailable place where he might seek to hide from the approachingcompany, and while he had passed several sentries unquestioned he couldscarce hope to escape scrutiny and questioning from a patrol, as henaturally assumed this body of men to be.

  Inside the doorway he discovered a passage turning abruptly to theright and almost immediately thereafter to the left. There was none insight within and so he stepped cautiously around the second turn themore effectually to be hidden from the street. Before him stretched along corridor, dimly lighted like the entrance. Waiting there he heardthe party approach the building, he heard someone at the entrance tohis hiding place, and then he heard the door past which he had comeslam to. He laid his hand upon his sword, expecting momentarily to hearfootsteps approaching along the corridor; but none came. He approachedthe turn and looked around it; the corridor was empty to the closeddoor. Whoever had closed it had remained upon the outside.

  Turan waited, listening. He heard no sound. Then he advanced to thedoor and placed an ear against it. All was silence in the streetbeyond. A sud
den draft must have closed the door, or perhaps it was theduty of the patrol to see to such things. It was immaterial. They hadevidently passed on and now he would return to the street and continueupon his way. Somewhere there would be a public fountain where he couldobtain water, and the chance of food lay in the strings of driedvegetables and meat which hung before the doorways of nearly everyBarsoomian home of the poorer classes that he had ever seen. It wasthis district he was seeking, and it was for this reason his search hadled him away from the main gate of the city which he knew would not belocated in a poor district.

  He attempted to open the door only to find that it resisted his everyeffort--it was locked upon the outside. Here indeed was a sorrycontretemps. Turan the panthan scratched his head. "Fortune frowns uponme," he murmured; but beyond the door, Fate, in the form of a paintedwarrior, stood smiling. Neatly had he tricked the unwary stranger. Thelighted doorway, the marching patrol--these had been planned and timedto a nicety by the third warrior who had sped ahead of Turan alonganother avenue, and the stranger had done precisely what the fellow hadthought he would do--no wonder, then, that he smiled.

  This exit barred to him Turan turned back into the corridor. Hefollowed it cautiously and silently. Occasionally there was a door onone side or the other. These he tried only to find each securelylocked. The corridor wound more erratically the farther he advanced. Alocked door barred his way at its end, but a door upon his right openedand he stepped into a dimly-lighted chamber, about the walls of whichwere three other doors, each of which he tried in turn. Two werelocked; the other opened upon a runway leading downward. It was spiraland he could see no farther than the first turn. A door in the corridorhe had quitted opened after he had passed, and the third warriorstepped out and followed after him. A faint smile still lingered uponthe fellow's grim lips.

  Turan drew his short-sword and cautiously descended. At the bottom wasa short corridor with a closed door at the end. He approached thesingle heavy panel and listened. No sound came to him from beyond themysterious portal. Gently he tried the door, which swung easily towardhim at his touch. Before him was a low-ceiled chamber with a dirtfloor. Set in its walls were several other doors and all were closed.As Turan stepped cautiously within, the third warrior descended thespiral runway behind him. The panthan crossed the room quickly andtried a door. It was locked. He heard a muffled click behind him andturned about with ready sword. He was alone; but the door through whichhe had entered was closed--it was the click of its lock that he hadheard.

  With a bound he crossed the room and attempted to open it; but to noavail. No longer did he seek silence, for he knew now that the thinghad gone beyond the sphere of chance. He threw his weight against thewooden panel; but the thick skeel of which it was constructed wouldhave withstood a battering ram. From beyond came a low laugh.

  Rapidly Turan examined each of the other doors. They were all locked. Aglance about the chamber revealed a wooden table and a bench. Set inthe walls were several heavy rings to which rusty chains wereattached--all too significant of the purpose to which the room wasdedicated. In the dirt floor near the wall were two or three holesresembling the mouths of burrows--doubtless the habitat of the giantMartian rat. He had observed this much when suddenly the dim light wasextinguished, leaving him in darkness utter and complete. Turan,groping about, sought the table and the bench. Placing the latteragainst the wall he drew the table in front of him and sat down uponthe bench, his long-sword gripped in readiness before him. At leastthey should fight before they took him.

  For some time he sat there waiting for he knew not what. No soundpenetrated to his subterranean dungeon. He slowly revolved in his mindthe incidents of the evening--the open, unguarded gate; the lighteddoorway--the only one he had seen thus open and lighted along theavenue he had followed; the advance of the warriors at precisely themoment that he could find no other avenue of escape or concealment; thecorridors and chambers that led past many locked doors to thisunderground prison leaving no other path for him to pursue.

  "By my first ancestor!" he swore; "but it was simple and I a simpleton.They tricked me neatly and have taken me without exposing themselves toa scratch; but for what purpose?"

  He wished that he might answer that question and then his thoughtsturned to the girl waiting there on the hill beyond the city forhim--and he would never come. He knew the ways of the more savagepeoples of Barsoom. No, he would never come, now. He had disobeyed her.He smiled at the sweet recollection of those words of command that hadfallen from her dear lips. He had disobeyed her and now he had lost thereward.

  But what of her? What now would be her fate--starving before a hostilecity with only an inhuman kaldane for company? Another thought--ahorrid thought--obtruded itself upon him. She had told him of thehideous sights she had witnessed in the burrows of the kaldanes and heknew that they ate human flesh. Ghek was starving. Should he eat hisrykor he would be helpless; but--there was sustenance there for themboth, for the rykor and the kaldane. Turan cursed himself for a fool.Why had he left her? Far better to have remained and died with her,ready always to protect her, than to have left her at the mercy of thehideous Bantoomian.

  Now Turan detected a heavy odor in the air. It oppressed him with afeeling of drowsiness. He would have risen to fight off the creepinglethargy, but his legs seemed weak, so that he sank again to the bench.Presently his sword slipped from his fingers and he sprawled forwardupon the table his head resting upon his arms.

  * * * * *

  Tara of Helium, as the night wore on and Turan did not return, becamemore and more uneasy, and when dawn broke with no sign of him sheguessed that he had failed. Something more than her own unhappypredicament brought a feeling of sorrow to her heart--of sorrow andloneliness. She realized now how she had come to depend upon thispanthan not only for protection but for companionship as well. Shemissed him, and in missing him realized suddenly that he had meant moreto her than a mere hired warrior. It was as though a friend had beentaken from her--an old and valued friend. She rose from her place ofconcealment that she might have a better view of the city.

  U-Dor, dwar of the 8th Utan of O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator, rode back inthe early dawn toward Manator from a brief excursion to a neighboringvillage. As he was rounding the hills south of the city, his keen eyeswere attracted by a slight movement among the shrubbery close to thesummit of the nearest hill. He halted his vicious mount and watchedmore closely. He saw a figure rise facing away from him and peer downtoward Manator beyond the hill.

  "Come!" he signalled to his followers, and with a word to his thoatturned the beast at a rapid gallop up the hillside. In his wake swepthis twenty savage warriors, the padded feet of their mounts soundlessupon the soft turf. It was the rattle of sidearms and harness thatbrought Tara of Helium suddenly about, facing them. She saw a score ofwarriors with couched lances bearing down upon her.

  She glanced at Ghek. What would the spiderman do in this emergency? Shesaw him crawl to his rykor and attach himself. Then he arose, thebeautiful body once again animated and alert. She thought that thecreature was preparing for flight. Well, it made little difference toher. Against such as were streaming up the hill toward them a singlemediocre swordsman such as Ghek was worse than no defense at all.

  "Hurry, Ghek!" she admonished him. "Back into the hills! You may findthere a hiding-place;" but the creature only stepped between her andthe oncoming riders, drawing his long-sword.

  "It is useless, Ghek," she said, when she saw that he intended todefend her. "What can a single sword accomplish against such odds?"

  "I can die but once," replied the kaldane. "You and your panthan savedme from Luud and I but do what your panthan would do were he here toprotect you."

  "It is brave, but it is useless," she replied. "Sheathe your sword.They may not intend us harm."

  Ghek let the point of his weapon drop to the ground, but he did notsheathe it, and thus the two stood waiting as U-Dor the dwar stoppedhis thoat before them while his twenty warriors forme
d a rough circleabout. For a long minute U-Dor sat his mount in silence, lookingsearchingly first at Tara of Helium and then at her hideous companion.

  "What manner of creature are you?" he asked presently. "And what do youbefore the gates of Manator?"

  "We are from far countries," replied the girl, "and we are lost andstarving. We ask only food and rest and the privilege to go our wayseeking our own homes."

  U-Dor smiled a grim smile. "Manator and the hills which guard it aloneknow the age of Manator," he said; "yet in all the ages that haverolled by since Manator first was, there be no record in the annals ofManator of a stranger departing from Manator."

  "But I am a princess," cried the girl haughtily, "and my country is notat war with yours. You must give me and my companions aid and assist usto return to our own land. It is the law of Barsoom."

  "Manator knows only the laws of Manator," replied U-Dor; "but come. Youshall go with us to the city, where you, being beautiful, need have nofear. I, myself, will protect you if O-Tar so decrees. And as for yourcompanion--but hold! You said 'companions'--there are others of yourparty then?"

  "You see what you see," replied Tara haughtily.

  "Be that as it may," said U-Dor. "If there be more they shall notescape Manator; but as I was saying, if your companion fights well hetoo may live, for O-Tar is just, and just are the laws of Manator.Come!"

  Ghek demurred.

  "It is useless," said the girl, seeing that he would have stood hisground and fought them. "Let us go with them. Why pit your puny bladeagainst their mighty ones when there should lie in your great brain themeans to outwit them?" She spoke in a low whisper, rapidly.

  "You are right, Tara of Helium," he replied and sheathed his sword.

  And so they moved down the hillside toward the gates of Manator--Tara,Princess of Helium, and Ghek, the kaldane of Bantoom--and surroundingthem rode the savage, painted warriors of U-Dor, dwar of the 8th Utanof O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator.