A Princess of Mars (23 page)

Another messenger now entered with word that I was still within the
palace walls.

"The likeness of every person who has entered or left the palace
grounds today has been carefully examined," concluded the fellow,
"and not one approaches the likeness of this new padwar of the
guards, other than that which was recorded of him at the time he
entered."

"Then we will have him shortly," commented Than Kosis contentedly,
"and in the meanwhile we will repair to the apartments of the
Princess of Helium and question her in regard to the affair. She
may know more than she cared to divulge to you, Notan. Come."

They left the hall, and, as darkness had fallen without, I slipped
lightly from my hiding place and hastened to the balcony. Few were
in sight, and choosing a moment when none seemed near I sprang
quickly to the top of the glass wall and from there to the avenue
beyond the palace grounds.

Without effort at concealment I hastened to the vicinity of our
quarters, where I felt sure I should find Kantos Kan. As I neared
the building I became more careful, as I judged, and rightly, that
the place would be guarded. Several men in civilian metal loitered
near the front entrance and in the rear were others. My only means
of reaching, unseen, the upper story where our apartments were
situated was through an adjoining building, and after considerable
maneuvering I managed to attain the roof of a shop several doors
away.

Leaping from roof to roof, I soon reached an open window in the
building where I hoped to find the Heliumite, and in another moment
I stood in the room before him. He was alone and showed no surprise
at my coming, saying he had expected me much earlier, as my tour of
duty must have ended some time since.

I saw that he knew nothing of the events of the day at the palace,
and when I had enlightened him he was all excitement. The news that
Dejah Thoris had promised her hand to Sab Than filled him with
dismay.

"It cannot be," he exclaimed. "It is impossible! Why no man in all
Helium but would prefer death to the selling of our loved princess
to the ruling house of Zodanga. She must have lost her mind to have
assented to such an atrocious bargain. You, who do not know how we
of Helium love the members of our ruling house, cannot appreciate
the horror with which I contemplate such an unholy alliance."

"What can be done, John Carter?" he continued. "You are a
resourceful man. Can you not think of some way to save Helium from
this disgrace?"

"If I can come within sword's reach of Sab Than," I answered, "I can
solve the difficulty in so far as Helium is concerned, but for
personal reasons I would prefer that another struck the blow that
frees Dejah Thoris."

Kantos Kan eyed me narrowly before he spoke.

"You love her!" he said. "Does she know it?"

"She knows it, Kantos Kan, and repulses me only because she is
promised to Sab Than."

The splendid fellow sprang to his feet, and grasping me by the
shoulder raised his sword on high, exclaiming:

"And had the choice been left to me I could not have chosen a more
fitting mate for the first princess of Barsoom. Here is my hand
upon your shoulder, John Carter, and my word that Sab Than shall go
out at the point of my sword for the sake of my love for Helium, for
Dejah Thoris, and for you. This very night I shall try to reach his
quarters in the palace."

"How?" I asked. "You are strongly guarded and a quadruple force
patrols the sky."

He bent his head in thought a moment, then raised it with an air of
confidence.

"I only need to pass these guards and I can do it," he said at last.
"I know a secret entrance to the palace through the pinnacle of the
highest tower. I fell upon it by chance one day as I was passing
above the palace on patrol duty. In this work it is required that
we investigate any unusual occurrence we may witness, and a face
peering from the pinnacle of the high tower of the palace was, to
me, most unusual. I therefore drew near and discovered that the
possessor of the peering face was none other than Sab Than. He was
slightly put out at being detected and commanded me to keep the
matter to myself, explaining that the passage from the tower led
directly to his apartments, and was known only to him. If I can
reach the roof of the barracks and get my machine I can be in Sab
Than's quarters in five minutes; but how am I to escape from this
building, guarded as you say it is?"

"How well are the machine sheds at the barracks guarded?" I asked.

"There is usually but one man on duty there at night upon the roof."

"Go to the roof of this building, Kantos Kan, and wait me there."

Without stopping to explain my plans I retraced my way to the street
and hastened to the barracks. I did not dare to enter the building,
filled as it was with members of the air-scout squadron, who, in
common with all Zodanga, were on the lookout for me.

The building was an enormous one, rearing its lofty head fully a
thousand feet into the air. But few buildings in Zodanga were
higher than these barracks, though several topped it by a few
hundred feet; the docks of the great battleships of the line
standing some fifteen hundred feet from the ground, while the
freight and passenger stations of the merchant squadrons rose nearly
as high.

It was a long climb up the face of the building, and one fraught
with much danger, but there was no other way, and so I essayed the
task. The fact that Barsoomian architecture is extremely ornate
made the feat much simpler than I had anticipated, since I found
ornamental ledges and projections which fairly formed a perfect
ladder for me all the way to the eaves of the building. Here I met
my first real obstacle. The eaves projected nearly twenty feet from
the wall to which I clung, and though I encircled the great building
I could find no opening through them.

The top floor was alight, and filled with soldiers engaged in the
pastimes of their kind; I could not, therefore, reach the roof
through the building.

There was one slight, desperate chance, and that I decided I must
take—it was for Dejah Thoris, and no man has lived who would not
risk a thousand deaths for such as she.

Clinging to the wall with my feet and one hand, I unloosened one of
the long leather straps of my trappings at the end of which dangled
a great hook by which air sailors are hung to the sides and bottoms
of their craft for various purposes of repair, and by means of which
landing parties are lowered to the ground from the battleships.

I swung this hook cautiously to the roof several times before it
finally found lodgment; gently I pulled on it to strengthen its
hold, but whether it would bear the weight of my body I did not
know. It might be barely caught upon the very outer verge of the
roof, so that as my body swung out at the end of the strap it would
slip off and launch me to the pavement a thousand feet below.

An instant I hesitated, and then, releasing my grasp upon the
supporting ornament, I swung out into space at the end of the
strap. Far below me lay the brilliantly lighted streets, the hard
pavements, and death. There was a little jerk at the top of the
supporting eaves, and a nasty slipping, grating sound which turned
me cold with apprehension; then the hook caught and I was safe.

Clambering quickly aloft I grasped the edge of the eaves and drew
myself to the surface of the roof above. As I gained my feet I was
confronted by the sentry on duty, into the muzzle of whose revolver
I found myself looking.

"Who are you and whence came you?" he cried.

"I am an air scout, friend, and very near a dead one, for just by
the merest chance I escaped falling to the avenue below," I replied.

"But how came you upon the roof, man? No one has landed or come up
from the building for the past hour. Quick, explain yourself, or I
call the guard."

"Look you here, sentry, and you shall see how I came and how close a
shave I had to not coming at all," I answered, turning toward the
edge of the roof, where, twenty feet below, at the end of my strap,
hung all my weapons.

The fellow, acting on impulse of curiosity, stepped to my side and
to his undoing, for as he leaned to peer over the eaves I grasped
him by his throat and his pistol arm and threw him heavily to the
roof. The weapon dropped from his grasp, and my fingers choked off
his attempted cry for assistance. I gagged and bound him and then
hung him over the edge of the roof as I myself had hung a few
moments before. I knew it would be morning before he would be
discovered, and I needed all the time that I could gain.

Donning my trappings and weapons I hastened to the sheds, and soon
had out both my machine and Kantos Kan's. Making his fast behind
mine I started my engine, and skimming over the edge of the roof I
dove down into the streets of the city far below the plane usually
occupied by the air patrol. In less than a minute I was settling
safely upon the roof of our apartment beside the astonished Kantos
Kan.

I lost no time in explanation, but plunged immediately into a
discussion of our plans for the immediate future. It was decided
that I was to try to make Helium while Kantos Kan was to enter the
palace and dispatch Sab Than. If successful he was then to follow
me. He set my compass for me, a clever little device which will
remain steadfastly fixed upon any given point on the surface of
Barsoom, and bidding each other farewell we rose together and sped
in the direction of the palace which lay in the route which I must
take to reach Helium.

As we neared the high tower a patrol shot down from above, throwing
its piercing searchlight full upon my craft, and a voice roared out
a command to halt, following with a shot as I paid no attention to
his hail. Kantos Kan dropped quickly into the darkness, while I
rose steadily and at terrific speed raced through the Martian sky
followed by a dozen of the air-scout craft which had joined the
pursuit, and later by a swift cruiser carrying a hundred men and
a battery of rapid-fire guns. By twisting and turning my little
machine, now rising and now falling, I managed to elude their
search-lights most of the time, but I was also losing ground by
these tactics, and so I decided to hazard everything on a
straight-away course and leave the result to fate and the speed
of my machine.

Kantos Kan had shown me a trick of gearing, which is known only
to the navy of Helium, that greatly increased the speed of our
machines, so that I felt sure I could distance my pursuers if
I could dodge their projectiles for a few moments.

As I sped through the air the screeching of the bullets around me
convinced me that only by a miracle could I escape, but the die was
cast, and throwing on full speed I raced a straight course toward
Helium. Gradually I left my pursuers further and further behind,
and I was just congratulating myself on my lucky escape, when a
well-directed shot from the cruiser exploded at the prow of my
little craft. The concussion nearly capsized her, and with a
sickening plunge she hurtled downward through the dark night.

How far I fell before I regained control of the plane I do not know,
but I must have been very close to the ground when I started to rise
again, as I plainly heard the squealing of animals below me. Rising
again I scanned the heavens for my pursuers, and finally making out
their lights far behind me, saw that they were landing, evidently
in search of me.

Not until their lights were no longer discernible did I venture
to flash my little lamp upon my compass, and then I found to my
consternation that a fragment of the projectile had utterly
destroyed my only guide, as well as my speedometer. It was true
I could follow the stars in the general direction of Helium, but
without knowing the exact location of the city or the speed at
which I was traveling my chances for finding it were slim.

Helium lies a thousand miles southwest of Zodanga, and with my
compass intact I should have made the trip, barring accidents, in
between four and five hours. As it turned out, however, morning
found me speeding over a vast expanse of dead sea bottom after
nearly six hours of continuous flight at high speed. Presently a
great city showed below me, but it was not Helium, as that alone of
all Barsoomian metropolises consists in two immense circular walled
cities about seventy-five miles apart and would have been easily
distinguishable from the altitude at which I was flying.

Believing that I had come too far to the north and west, I turned
back in a southeasterly direction, passing during the forenoon
several other large cities, but none resembling the description
which Kantos Kan had given me of Helium. In addition to the
twin-city formation of Helium, another distinguishing feature is the
two immense towers, one of vivid scarlet rising nearly a mile into
the air from the center of one of the cities, while the other, of
bright yellow and of the same height, marks her sister.

About noon I passed low over a great dead city of ancient Mars, and
as I skimmed out across the plain beyond I came full upon several
thousand green warriors engaged in a terrific battle. Scarcely had
I seen them than a volley of shots was directed at me, and with the
almost unfailing accuracy of their aim my little craft was instantly
a ruined wreck, sinking erratically to the ground.

I fell almost directly in the center of the fierce combat, among
warriors who had not seen my approach so busily were they engaged
in life and death struggles. The men were fighting on foot with
long-swords, while an occasional shot from a sharpshooter on the
outskirts of the conflict would bring down a warrior who might
for an instant separate himself from the entangled mass.