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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.07/27/01*END* + + + + + + + + + + + +Created by Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska +</pre> +<h1>Out of Time’s Abyss</h1> +<h2>By Edgar Rice Burroughs</h2> +<hr /> +<h3><a id="Contents" name="Contents"></a>Contents</h3> +<ul> +<li><a href="#Ch_1">Chapter 1</a></li> +<li><a href="#Ch_2">Chapter 2</a></li> +<li><a href="#Ch_3">Chapter 3</a></li> +<li><a href="#Ch_4">Chapter 4</a></li> +<li><a href="#Ch_5">Chapter 5</a></li> +</ul> +<hr /> +<h3><a id="Ch_1" name="Ch_1"></a>Chapter 1</h3> +<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of +Contents</a></p> +<p>This is the tale of Bradley after he left Fort Dinosaur upon the +west coast of the great lake that is in the center of the +island.</p> +<p>Upon the fourth day of September, 1916, he set out with four +companions, Sinclair, Brady, James, and Tippet, to search along the +base of the barrier cliffs for a point at which they might be +scaled.</p> +<p>Through the heavy Caspakian air, beneath the swollen sun, the +five men marched northwest from Fort Dinosaur, now waist-deep in +lush, jungle grasses starred with myriad gorgeous blooms, now +across open meadow-land and parklike expanses and again plunging +into dense forests of eucalyptus and acacia and giant arboreous +ferns with feathered fronds waving gently a hundred feet above +their heads.</p> +<p>About them upon the ground, among the trees and in the air over +them moved and swung and soared the countless forms of +Caspak’s teeming life. Always were they menaced by some +frightful thing and seldom were their rifles cool, yet even in the +brief time they had dwelt upon Caprona they had become callous to +danger, so that they swung along laughing and chatting like +soldiers on a summer hike.</p> +<p>“This reminds me of South Clark Street,” remarked +Brady, who had once served on the traffic squad in Chicago; and as +no one asked him why, he volunteered that it was “because +it’s no place for an Irishman.”</p> +<p>“South Clark Street and heaven have something in common, +then,” suggested Sinclair. James and Tippet laughed, and then +a hideous growl broke from a dense thicket ahead and diverted their +attention to other matters.</p> +<p>“One of them behemoths of ’Oly Writ,” muttered +Tippet as they came to a halt and with guns ready awaited the +almost inevitable charge.</p> +<p>“Hungry lot o’ beggars, these,” said Bradley; +“always trying to eat everything they see.”</p> +<p>For a moment no further sound came from the thicket. “He +may be feeding now,” suggested Bradley. “We’ll +try to go around him. Can’t waste ammunition. Won’t +last forever. Follow me.” And he set off at right angles to +their former course, hoping to avert a charge. They had taken a +dozen steps, perhaps, when the thicket moved to the advance of the +thing within it, the leafy branches parted, and the hideous head of +a gigantic bear emerged.</p> +<p>“Pick your trees,” whispered Bradley. +“Can’t waste ammunition.”</p> +<p>The men looked about them. The bear took a couple of steps +forward, still growling menacingly. He was exposed to the shoulders +now. Tippet took one look at the monster and bolted for the nearest +tree; and then the bear charged. He charged straight for Tippet. +The other men scattered for the various trees they had +selected—all except Bradley. He stood watching Tippet and the +bear. The man had a good start and the tree was not far away; but +the speed of the enormous creature behind him was something to +marvel at, yet Tippet was in a fair way to make his sanctuary when +his foot caught in a tangle of roots and down he went, his rifle +flying from his hand and falling several yards away. Instantly +Bradley’s piece was at his shoulder, there was a sharp report +answered by a roar of mingled rage and pain from the carnivore. +Tippet attempted to scramble to his feet.</p> +<p>“Lie still!” shouted Bradley. “Can’t +waste ammunition.”</p> +<p>The bear halted in its tracks, wheeled toward Bradley and then +back again toward Tippet. Again the former’s rifle spit +angrily, and the bear turned again in his direction. Bradley +shouted loudly. “Come on, you behemoth of Holy Writ!” +he cried. “Come on, you duffer! Can’t waste +ammunition.” And as he saw the bear apparently upon the verge +of deciding to charge him, he encouraged the idea by backing +rapidly away, knowing that an angry beast will more often charge +one who moves than one who lies still.</p> +<p>And the bear did charge. Like a bolt of lightning he flashed +down upon the Englishman. “Now run!” Bradley called to +Tippet and himself turned in flight toward a nearby tree. The other +men, now safely ensconced upon various branches, watched the race +with breathless interest. Would Bradley make it? It seemed scarce +possible. And if he didn’t! James gasped at the thought. Six +feet at the shoulder stood the frightful mountain of blood-mad +flesh and bone and sinew that was bearing down with the speed of an +express train upon the seemingly slow-moving man.</p> +<p>It all happened in a few seconds; but they were seconds that +seemed like hours to the men who watched. They saw Tippet leap to +his feet at Bradley’s shouted warning. They saw him run, +stooping to recover his rifle as he passed the spot where it had +fallen. They saw him glance back toward Bradley, and then they saw +him stop short of the tree that might have given him safety and +turn back in the direction of the bear. Firing as he ran, Tippet +raced after the great cave bear—the monstrous thing that +should have been extinct ages before—ran for it and fired +even as the beast was almost upon Bradley. The men in the trees +scarcely breathed. It seemed to them such a futile thing for Tippet +to do, and Tippet of all men! They had never looked upon Tippet as +a coward—there seemed to be no cowards among that strangely +assorted company that Fate had gathered together from the four +corners of the earth—but Tippet was considered a cautious +man. Overcautious, some thought him. How futile he and his little +pop-gun appeared as he dashed after that living engine of +destruction! But, oh, how glorious! It was some such thought as +this that ran through Brady’s mind, though articulated it +might have been expressed otherwise, albeit more forcefully.</p> +<p>Just then it occurred to Brady to fire and he, too, opened upon +the bear, but at the same instant the animal stumbled and fell +forward, though still growling most fearsomely. Tippet never +stopped running or firing until he stood within a foot of the +brute, which lay almost touching Bradley and was already struggling +to regain its feet. Placing the muzzle of his gun against the +bear’s ear, Tippet pulled the trigger. The creature sank +limply to the ground and Bradley scrambled to his feet.</p> +<p>“Good work, Tippet,” he said. “Mightily +obliged to you—awful waste of ammunition, really.”</p> +<p>And then they resumed the march and in fifteen minutes the +encounter had ceased even to be a topic of conversation.</p> +<p>For two days they continued upon their perilous way. Already the +cliffs loomed high and forbidding close ahead without sign of break +to encourage hope that somewhere they might be scaled. Late in the +afternoon the party crossed a small stream of warm water upon the +sluggishly moving surface of which floated countless millions of +tiny green eggs surrounded by a light scum of the same color, +though of a darker shade. Their past experience of Caspak had +taught them that they might expect to come upon a stagnant pool of +warm water if they followed the stream to its source; but there +they were almost certain to find some of Caspak’s grotesque, +manlike creatures. Already since they had disembarked from the U-33 +after its perilous trip through the subterranean channel beneath +the barrier cliffs had brought them into the inland sea of Caspak, +had they encountered what had appeared to be three distinct types +of these creatures. There had been the pure apes—huge, +gorillalike beasts—and those who walked, a trifle more erect +and had features with just a shade more of the human cast about +them. Then there were men like Ahm, whom they had captured and +confined at the fort—Ahm, the club-man. “Well-known +club-man,” Tyler had called him. Ahm and his people had +knowledge of a speech. They had a language, in which they were +unlike the race just inferior to them, and they walked much more +erect and were less hairy: but it was principally the fact that +they possessed a spoken language and carried a weapon that +differentiated them from the others.</p> +<p>All of these peoples had proven belligerent in the extreme. In +common with the rest of the fauna of Caprona the first law of +nature as they seemed to understand it was to +kill—kill—kill. And so it was that Bradley had no +desire to follow up the little stream toward the pool near which +were sure to be the caves of some savage tribe, but fortune played +him an unkind trick, for the pool was much closer than he imagined, +its southern end reaching fully a mile south of the point at which +they crossed the stream, and so it was that after forcing their way +through a tangle of jungle vegetation they came out upon the edge +of the pool which they had wished to avoid.</p> +<p>Almost simultaneously there appeared south of them a party of +naked men armed with clubs and hatchets. Both parties halted as +they caught sight of one another. The men from the fort saw before +them a hunting party evidently returning to its caves or village +laden with meat. They were large men with features closely +resembling those of the African Negro though their skins were +white. Short hair grew upon a large portion of their limbs and +bodies, which still retained a considerable trace of apish +progenitors. They were, however, a distinctly higher type than the +Bo-lu, or club-men.</p> +<p>Bradley would have been glad to have averted a meeting; but as +he desired to lead his party south around the end of the pool, and +as it was hemmed in by the jungle on one side and the water on the +other, there seemed no escape from an encounter.</p> +<p>On the chance that he might avoid a clash, Bradley stepped +forward with upraised hand. “We are friends, ” he +called in the tongue of Ahm, the Bolu, who had been held a prisoner +at the fort; “permit us to pass in peace. We will not harm +you.”</p> +<p>At this the hatchet-men set up a great jabbering with much +laughter, loud and boisterous. “No,” shouted one, +“you will not harm us, for we shall kill you. Come! We kill! +We kill!” And with hideous shouts they charged down upon the +Europeans.</p> +<p>“Sinclair, you may fire,” said Bradley +quietly.” Pick off the leader. Can’t waste +ammunition.”</p> +<p>The Englishman raised his piece to his shoulder and took quick +aim at the breast of the yelling savage leaping toward them. +Directly behind the leader came another hatchet-man, and with the +report of Sinclair’s rifle both warriors lunged forward in +the tall grass, pierced by the same bullet. The effect upon the +rest of the band was electrical. As one man they came to a sudden +halt, wheeled to the east and dashed into the jungle, where the men +could hear them forcing their way in an effort to put as much +distance as possible between themselves and the authors of this new +and frightful noise that killed warriors at a great distance.</p> +<p>Both the savages were dead when Bradley approached to examine +them, and as the Europeans gathered around, other eyes were bent +upon them with greater curiosity than they displayed for the victim +of Sinclair’s bullet. When the party again took up the march +around the southern end of the pool the owner of the eyes followed +them—large, round eyes, almost expressionless except for a +certain cold cruelty which glinted malignly from under their pale +gray irises.</p> +<p>All unconscious of the stalker, the men came, late in the +afternoon, to a spot which seemed favorable as a campsite. A cold +spring bubbled from the base of a rocky formation which overhung +and partially encircled a small inclosure. At Bradley’s +command, the men took up the duties assigned them—gathering +wood, building a cook-fire and preparing the evening meal. It was +while they were thus engaged that Brady’s attention was +attracted by the dismal flapping of huge wings. He glanced up, +expecting to see one of the great flying reptiles of a bygone age, +his rifle ready in his hand. Brady was a brave man. He had groped +his way up narrow tenement stairs and taken an armed maniac from a +dark room without turning a hair; but now as he looked up, he went +white and staggered back.</p> +<p>“Gawd!” he almost screamed. “What is +it?”</p> +<p>Attracted by Brady’s cry the others seized their rifles as +they followed his wide-eyed, frozen gaze, nor was there one of them +that was not moved by some species of terror or awe. Then Brady +spoke again in an almost inaudible voice. “Holy Mother +protect us—it’s a banshee!”</p> +<p>Bradley, always cool almost to indifference in the face of +danger, felt a strange, creeping sensation run over his flesh, as +slowly, not a hundred feet above them, the thing flapped itself +across the sky, its huge, round eyes glaring down upon them. And +until it disappeared over the tops of the trees of a near-by wood +the five men stood as though paralyzed, their eyes never leaving +the weird shape; nor never one of them appearing to recall that he +grasped a loaded rifle in his hands.</p> +<p>With the passing of the thing, came the reaction. Tippet sank to +the ground and buried his face in his hands. “Oh, +Gord,” he moaned. “Tyke me awy from this orful +plice.” Brady, recovered from the first shock, swore loud and +luridly. He called upon all the saints to witness that he was +unafraid and that anybody with half an eye could have seen that the +creature was nothing more than “one av thim flyin’ +alligators” that they all were familiar with.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Sinclair with fine sarcasm, +“we’ve saw so many of them with white shrouds on +’em.”</p> +<p>“Shut up, you fool!” growled Brady. “If you +know so much, tell us what it was after bein’ +then.”</p> +<p>Then he turned toward Bradley. “What was it, sor, do you +think?” he asked.</p> +<p>Bradley shook his head. “I don’t know,” he +said. “It looked like a winged human being clothed in a +flowing white robe. Its face was more human than otherwise. That is +the way it looked to me; but what it really was I can’t even +guess, for such a creature is as far beyond my experience or +knowledge as it is beyond yours. All that I am sure of is that +whatever else it may have been, it was quite material—it was +no ghost; rather just another of the strange forms of life which we +have met here and with which we should be accustomed by this +time.”</p> +<p>Tippet looked up. His face was still ashy. “Yer +cawn’t tell me,” he cried. “Hi seen hit. Blime, +Hi seen hit. Hit was ha dead man flyin’ through the hair. +Didn’t Hi see ’is heyes? Oh, Gord! Didn’t Hi see +’em?”</p> +<p>“It didn’t look like any beast or reptile to +me,” spoke up Sinclair. “It was lookin’ right +down at me when I looked up and I saw its face plain as I see +yours. It had big round eyes that looked all cold and dead, and its +cheeks were sunken in deep, and I could see its yellow teeth behind +thin, tight-drawn lips—like a man who had been dead a long +while, sir,” he added, turning toward Bradley.</p> +<p>“Yes!” James had not spoken since the apparition had +passed over them, and now it was scarce speech which he +uttered—rather a series of articulate gasps. +“Yes—dead—a—long—while. +It—means something. It—come—for some—one. +For one—of us. One—of us is goin’— to die. +I’m goin’ to die!” he ended in a wail.</p> +<p>“Come! Come!” snapped Bradley. “Won’t +do. Won’t do at all. Get to work, all of you. Waste of time. +Can’t waste time.”</p> +<p>His authoritative tones brought them all up standing, and +presently each was occupied with his own duties; but each worked in +silence and there was no singing and no bantering such as had +marked the making of previous camps. Not until they had eaten and +to each had been issued the little ration of smoking tobacco +allowed after each evening meal did any sign of a relaxation of +taut nerves appear. It was Brady who showed the first signs of +returning good spirits. He commenced humming “It’s a +Long Way to Tipperary” and presently to voice the words, but +he was well into his third song before anyone joined him, and even +then there seemed a dismal note in even the gayest of tunes.</p> +<p>A huge fire blazed in the opening of their rocky shelter that +the prowling carnivora might be kept at bay; and always one man +stood on guard, watchfully alert against a sudden rush by some +maddened beast of the jungle. Beyond the fire, yellow-green spots +of flame appeared, moved restlessly about, disappeared and +reappeared, accompanied by a hideous chorus of screams and growls +and roars as the hungry meat-eaters hunting through the night were +attracted by the light or the scent of possible prey.</p> +<p>But to such sights and sounds as these the five men had become +callous. They sang or talked as unconcernedly as they might have +done in the bar-room of some publichouse at home.</p> +<p>Sinclair was standing guard. The others were listening to +Brady’s description of traffic congestion at the Rush Street +bridge during the rush hour at night. The fire crackled cheerily. +The owners of the yellow-green eyes raised their frightful chorus +to the heavens. Conditions seemed again to have returned to normal. +And then, as though the hand of Death had reached out and touched +them all, the five men tensed into sudden rigidity.</p> +<p>Above the nocturnal diapason of the teeming jungle sounded a +dismal flapping of wings and over head, through the thick night, a +shadowy form passed across the diffused light of the flaring +camp-fire. Sinclair raised his rifle and fired. An eerie wail +floated down from above and the apparition, whatever it might have +been, was swallowed by the darkness. For several seconds the +listening men heard the sound of those dismally flapping wings +lessening in the distance until they could no longer be heard.</p> +<p>Bradley was the first to speak. “Shouldn’t have +fired, Sinclair,” he said; “can’t waste +ammunition.” But there was no note of censure in his tone. It +was as though he understood the nervous reaction that had compelled +the other’s act.</p> +<p>“I couldn’t help it, sir,” said Sinclair. +“Lord, it would take an iron man to keep from shootin’ +at that awful thing. Do you believe in ghosts, sir?”</p> +<p>“No,” replied Bradley. “No such +things.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know about that,” said Brady. +“There was a woman murdered over on the prairie near +Brighton—her throat was cut from ear to ear, +and—”</p> +<p>“Shut up,” snapped Bradley.</p> +<p>“My grandaddy used to live down Coppington wy,” said +Tippet. “They were a hold ruined castle on a ’ill near +by, hand at midnight they used to see pale blue lights through the +windows an ’ear—”</p> +<p>“Will you close your hatch!” demanded Bradley. +“You fools will have yourselves scared to death in a minute. +Now go to sleep.”</p> +<p>But there was little sleep in camp that night until utter +exhaustion overtook the harassed men toward morning; nor was there +any return of the weird creature that had set the nerves of each of +them on edge.</p> +<p>The following forenoon the party reached the base of the barrier +cliffs and for two days marched northward in an effort to discover +a break in the frowning abutment that raised its rocky face almost +perpendicularly above them, yet nowhere was there the slightest +indication that the cliffs were scalable.</p> +<p>Disheartened, Bradley determined to turn back toward the fort, +as he already had exceeded the time decided upon by Bowen Tyler and +himself for the expedition. The cliffs for many miles had been +trending in a northeasterly direction, indicating to Bradley that +they were approaching the northern extremity of the island. +According to the best of his calculations they had made sufficient +easting during the past two days to have brought them to a point +almost directly north of Fort Dinosaur and as nothing could be +gained by retracing their steps along the base of the cliffs he +decided to strike due south through the unexplored country between +them and the fort.</p> +<p>That night (September 9, 1916), they made camp a short distance +from the cliffs beside one of the numerous cool springs that are to +be found within Caspak, oftentimes close beside the still more +numerous warm and hot springs which feed the many pools. After +supper the men lay smoking and chatting among themselves. Tippet +was on guard. Fewer night prowlers threatened them, and the men +were commenting upon the fact that the farther north they had +traveled the smaller the number of all species of animals became, +though it was still present in what would have seemed appalling +plenitude in any other part of the world. The diminution in +reptilian life was the most noticeable change in the fauna of +northern Caspak. Here, however, were forms they had not met +elsewhere, several of which were of gigantic proportions.</p> +<p>According to their custom all, with the exception of the man on +guard, sought sleep early, nor, once disposed upon the ground for +slumber, were they long in finding it. It seemed to Bradley that he +had scarcely closed his eyes when he was brought to his feet, wide +awake, by a piercing scream which was punctuated by the sharp +report of a rifle from the direction of the fire where Tippet stood +guard. As he ran toward the man, Bradley heard above him the same +uncanny wail that had set every nerve on edge several nights +before, and the dismal flapping of huge wings. He did not need to +look up at the white-shrouded figure winging slowly away into the +night to know that their grim visitor had returned.</p> +<p>The muscles of his arm, reacting to the sight and sound of the +menacing form, carried his hand to the butt of his pistol; but +after he had drawn the weapon, he immediately returned it to its +holster with a shrug.</p> +<p>“What for?” he muttered. “Can’t waste +ammunition.” Then he walked quickly to where Tippet lay +sprawled upon his face. By this time James, Brady and Sinclair were +at his heels, each with his rifle in readiness.</p> +<p>“Is he dead, sir?” whispered James as Bradley +kneeled beside the prostrate form.</p> +<p>Bradley turned Tippet over on his back and pressed an ear close +to the other’s heart. In a moment he raised his head. +“Fainted,” he announced. “Get water. +Hurry!” Then he loosened Tippet’s shirt at the throat +and when the water was brought, threw a cupful in the man’s +face. Slowly Tippet regained consciousness and sat up. At first he +looked curiously into the faces of the men about him; then an +expression of terror overspread his features. He shot a startled +glance up into the black void above and then burying his face in +his arms began to sob like a child.</p> +<p>“What’s wrong, man?” demanded Bradley. +“Buck up! Can’t play cry-baby. Waste of energy. What +happened?”</p> +<p>“Wot ’appened, sir!” wailed Tippet. “Oh, +Gord, sir! Hit came back. Hit came for me, sir. Right hit did, sir; +strite hat me, sir; hand with long w’ite ’ands it +clawed for me. Oh, Gord! Hit almost caught me, sir. Hi’m has +good as dead; Hi’m a marked man; that’s wot Hi ham. Hit +was a-goin’ for to carry me horf, sir.”</p> +<p>“Stuff and nonsense,” snapped Bradley. “Did +you get a good look at it?”</p> +<p>Tippet said that he did—a much better look than he wanted. +The thing had almost clutched him, and he had looked straight into +its eyes—“dead heyes in a dead face,” he had +described them.</p> +<p>“Wot was it after bein’, do you think?” +inquired Brady.</p> +<p>“Hit was Death,” moaned Tippet, shuddering, and +again a pall of gloom fell upon the little party.</p> +<p>The following day Tippet walked as one in a trance. He never +spoke except in reply to a direct question, which more often than +not had to be repeated before it could attract his attention. He +insisted that he was already a dead man, for if the thing +didn’t come for him during the day he would never live +through another night of agonized apprehension, waiting for the +frightful end that he was positive was in store for him. +“I’ll see to that,” he said, and they all knew +that Tippet meant to take his own life before darkness set in.</p> +<p>Bradley tried to reason with him, in his short, crisp way, but +soon saw the futility of it; nor could he take the man’s +weapons from him without subjecting him to almost certain death +from any of the numberless dangers that beset their way.</p> +<p>The entire party was moody and glum. There was none of the +bantering that had marked their intercourse before, even in the +face of blighting hardships and hideous danger. This was a new +menace that threatened them, something that they couldn’t +explain; and so, naturally, it aroused within them superstitious +fear which Tippet’s attitude only tended to augment. To add +further to their gloom, their way led through a dense forest, +where, on account of the underbrush, it was difficult to make even +a mile an hour. Constant watchfulness was required to avoid the +many snakes of various degrees of repulsiveness and enormity that +infested the wood; and the only ray of hope they had to cling to +was that the forest would, like the majority of Caspakian forests, +prove to be of no considerable extent.</p> +<p>Bradley was in the lead when he came suddenly upon a grotesque +creature of Titanic proportions. Crouching among the trees, which +here commenced to thin out slightly, Bradley saw what appeared to +be an enormous dragon devouring the carcass of a mammoth. From +frightful jaws to the tip of its long tail it was fully forty feet +in length. Its body was covered with plates of thick skin which +bore a striking resemblance to armor-plate. The creature saw +Bradley almost at the same instant that he saw it and reared up on +its enormous hind legs until its head towered a full twenty-five +feet above the ground. From the cavernous jaws issued a hissing +sound of a volume equal to the escaping steam from the +safety-valves of half a dozen locomotives, and then the creature +came for the man.</p> +<p>“Scatter!” shouted Bradley to those behind him; and +all but Tippet heeded the warning. The man stood as though dazed, +and when Bradley saw the other’s danger, he too stopped and +wheeling about sent a bullet into the massive body forcing its way +through the trees toward him. The shot struck the creature in the +belly where there was no protecting armor, eliciting a new note +which rose in a shrill whistle and ended in a wail. It was then +that Tippet appeared to come out of his trance, for with a cry of +terror he turned and fled to the left. Bradley, seeing that he had +as good an opportunity as the others to escape, now turned his +attention to extricating himself; and as the woods seemed dense on +the right, he ran in that direction, hoping that the close-set +boles would prevent pursuit on the part of the great reptile. The +dragon paid no further attention to him, however, for +Tippet’s sudden break for liberty had attracted its +attention; and after Tippet it went, bowling over small trees, +uprooting underbrush and leaving a wake behind it like that of a +small tornado.</p> +<p>Bradley, the moment he had discovered the thing was pursuing +Tippet, had followed it. He was afraid to fire for fear of hitting +the man, and so it was that he came upon them at the very moment +that the monster lunged its great weight forward upon the doomed +man. The sharp, three-toed talons of the forelimbs seized poor +Tippet, and Bradley saw the unfortunate fellow lifted high above +the ground as the creature again reared up on its hind legs, +immediately transferring Tippet’s body to its gaping jaws, +which closed with a sickening, crunching sound as Tippet’s +bones cracked beneath the great teeth.</p> +<p>Bradley half raised his rifle to fire again and then lowered it +with a shake of his head. Tippet was beyond succor—why waste +a bullet that Caspak could never replace? If he could now escape +the further notice of the monster it would be a wiser act than to +throw his life away in futile revenge. He saw that the reptile was +not looking in his direction, and so he slipped noiselessly behind +the bole of a large tree and thence quietly faded away in the +direction he believed the others to have taken. At what he +considered a safe distance he halted and looked back. Half hidden +by the intervening trees he still could see the huge head and the +massive jaws from which protrude the limp legs of the dead man. +Then, as though struck by the hammer of Thor, the creature +collapsed and crumpled to the ground. Bradley’s single +bullet, penetrating the body through the soft skin of the belly, +had slain the Titan.</p> +<p>A few minutes later, Bradley found the others of the party. The +four returned cautiously to the spot where the creature lay and +after convincing themselves that it was quite dead, came close to +it. It was an arduous and gruesome job extricating Tippet’s +mangled remains from the powerful jaws, the men working for the +most part silently.</p> +<p>“It was the work of the banshee all right,” muttered +Brady. “It warned poor Tippet, it did.”</p> +<p>“Hit killed him, that’s wot hit did, hand +hit’ll kill some more of us,” said James, his lower lip +trembling.</p> +<p>“If it was a ghost,” interjected Sinclair, +“and I don’t say as it was; but if it was, why, it +could take on any form it wanted to. It might have turned itself +into this thing, which ain’t no natural thing at all, just to +get poor Tippet. If it had of been a lion or something else +humanlike it wouldn’t look so strange; but this here thing +ain’t humanlike. There ain’t no such thing an’ +never was.”</p> +<p>“Bullets don’t kill ghosts,” said Bradley, +“so this couldn’t have been a ghost. Furthermore, there +are no such things. I’ve been trying to place this creature. +Just succeeded. It’s a tyrannosaurus. Saw picture of skeleton +in magazine. There’s one in New York Natural History Museum. +Seems to me it said it was found in place called Hell Creek +somewhere in western North America. Supposed to have lived about +six million years ago.”</p> +<p>“Hell Creek’s in Montana,” said Sinclair. +“I used to punch cows in Wyoming, an’ I’ve heard +of Hell Creek. Do you s’pose that there thing’s six +million years old?” His tone was skeptical.</p> +<p>“No,” replied Bradley; “But it would indicate +that the island of Caprona has stood almost without change for more +than six million years.”</p> +<p>The conversation and Bradley’s assurance that the creature +was not of supernatural origin helped to raise a trifle the spirits +of the men; and then came another diversion in the form of ravenous +meat-eaters attracted to the spot by the uncanny sense of smell +which had apprised them of the presence of flesh, killed and ready +for the eating.</p> +<p>It was a constant battle while they dug a grave and consigned +all that was mortal of John Tippet to his last, lonely +resting-place. Nor would they leave then; but remained to fashion a +rude head- stone from a crumbling out-cropping of sandstone and to +gather a mass of the gorgeous flowers growing in such great +profusion around them and heap the new-made grave with bright +blooms. Upon the headstone Sinclair scratched in rude characters +the words:</p> +<p class="cen">HERE LIES JOHN TIPPET<br /> +ENGLISHMAN<br /> +KILLED BY TYRANNOSAURUS<br /> +10 SEPT. A.D. 1916<br /> +R.I.P.</p> +<p>and Bradley repeated a short prayer before they left their +comrade forever.</p> +<p>For three days the party marched due south through forests and +meadow-land and great park-like areas where countless herbivorous +animals grazed—deer and antelope and bos and the little ecca, +the smallest species of Caspakian horse, about the size of a +rabbit. There were other horses too; but all were small, the +largest being not above eight hands in height. Preying continually +upon the herbivora were the meat-eaters, large and +small—wolves, hyaenadons, panthers, lions, tigers, and bear +as well as several large and ferocious species of reptilian +life.</p> +<p>On September twelfth the party scaled a line of sandstone cliffs +which crossed their route toward the south; but they crossed them +only after an encounter with the tribe that inhabited the numerous +caves which pitted the face of the escarpment. That night they +camped upon a rocky plateau which was sparsely wooded with jarrah, +and here once again they were visited by the weird, nocturnal +apparition that had already filled them with a nameless terror.</p> +<p>As on the night of September ninth the first warning came from +the sentinel standing guard over his sleeping companions. A +terror-stricken cry punctuated by the crack of a rifle brought +Bradley, Sinclair and Brady to their feet in time to see James, +with clubbed rifle, battling with a white-robed figure that hovered +on widespread wings on a level with the Englishman’s head. As +they ran, shouting, forward, it was obvious to them that the weird +and terrible apparition was attempting to seize James; but when it +saw the others coming to his rescue, it desisted, flapping rapidly +upward and away, its long, ragged wings giving forth the peculiarly +dismal notes which always characterized the sound of its +flying.</p> +<p>Bradley fired at the vanishing menacer of their peace and +safety; but whether he scored a hit or not, none could tell, +though, following the shot, there was wafted back to them the same +piercing wail that had on other occasions frozen their marrow.</p> +<p>Then they turned toward James, who lay face downward upon the +ground, trembling as with ague. For a time he could not even speak, +but at last regained sufficient composure to tell them how the +thing must have swooped silently upon him from above and behind as +the first premonition of danger he had received was when the long, +clawlike fingers had clutched him beneath either arm. In the melee +his rifle had been discharged and he had broken away at the same +instant and turned to defend himself with the butt. The rest they +had seen.</p> +<p>From that instant James was an absolutely broken man. He +maintained with shaking lips that his doom was sealed, that the +thing had marked him for its own, and that he was as good as dead, +nor could any amount of argument or raillery convince him to the +contrary. He had seen Tippet marked and claimed and now he had been +marked. Nor were his constant reiterations of this belief without +effect upon the rest of the party. Even Bradley felt depressed, +though for the sake of the others he managed to hide it beneath a +show of confidence he was far from feeling.</p> +<p>And on the following day William James was killed by a +saber-tooth tiger—September 13, 1916. Beneath a jarrah tree +on the stony plateau on the northern edge of the Sto-lu country in +the land that Time forgot, he lies in a lonely grave marked by a +rough headstone.</p> +<p>Southward from his grave marched three grim and silent men. To +the best of Bradley’s reckoning they were some twenty-five +miles north of Fort Dinosaur, and that they might reach the fort on +the following day, they plodded on until darkness overtook them. +With comparative safety fifteen miles away, they made camp at last; +but there was no singing now and no joking. In the bottom of his +heart each prayed that they might come safely through just this +night, for they knew that during the morrow they would make the +final stretch, yet the nerves of each were taut with strained +anticipation of what gruesome thing might flap down upon them from +the black sky, marking another for its own. Who would be the +next?</p> +<p>As was their custom, they took turns at guard, each man doing +two hours and then arousing the next. Brady had gone on from eight +to ten, followed by Sinclair from ten to twelve, then Bradley had +been awakened. Brady would stand the last guard from two to four, +as they had determined to start the moment that it became light +enough to insure comparative safety upon the trail.</p> +<p>The snapping of a twig aroused Brady out of a dead sleep, and as +he opened his eyes, he saw that it was broad daylight and that at +twenty paces from him stood a huge lion. As the man sprang to his +feet, his rifle ready in his hand, Sinclair awoke and took in the +scene in a single swift glance. The fire was out and Bradley was +nowhere in sight. For a long moment the lion and the men eyed one +another. The latter had no mind to fire if the beast minded its own +affairs—they were only too glad to let it go its way if it +would; but the lion was of a different mind.</p> +<p>Suddenly the long tail snapped stiffly erect, and as though it +had been attached to two trigger fingers the two rifles spoke in +unison, for both men knew this signal only too well—the +immediate forerunner of a deadly charge. As the brute’s head +had been raised, his spine had not been visible; and so they did +what they had learned by long experience was best to do. Each +covered a front leg, and as the tail snapped aloft, fired. With a +hideous roar the mighty flesh-eater lurched forward to the ground +with both front legs broken. It was an easy accomplishment in the +instant before the beast charged—after, it would have been +well-nigh an impossible feat. Brady stepped close in and finished +him with a shot in the base of the brain lest his terrific roarings +should attract his mate or others of their kind.</p> +<p>Then the two men turned and looked at one another. “Where +is Lieutenant Bradley?” asked Sinclair. They walked to the +fire. Only a few smoking embers remained. A few feet away lay +Bradley’s rifle. There was no evidence of a struggle. The two +men circled about the camp twice and on the last lap Brady stooped +and picked up an object which had lain about ten yards beyond the +fire—it was Bradley’s cap. Again the two looked +questioningly at one another, and then, simultaneously, both pairs +of eyes swung upward and searched the sky. A moment later Brady was +examining the ground about the spot where Bradley’s cap had +lain. It was one of those little barren, sandy stretches that they +had found only upon this stony plateau. Brady’s own footsteps +showed as plainly as black ink upon white paper; but his was the +only foot that had marred the smooth, windswept surface—there +was no sign that Bradley had crossed the spot upon the surface of +the ground, and yet his cap lay well toward the center of it.</p> +<p>Breakfastless and with shaken nerves the two survivors plunged +madly into the long day’s march. Both were strong, +courageous, resourceful men; but each had reached the limit of +human nerve endurance and each felt that he would rather die than +spend another night in the hideous open of that frightful land. +Vivid in the mind of each was a picture of Bradley’s end, for +though neither had witnessed the tragedy, both could imagine almost +precisely what had occurred. They did not discuss it—they did +not even mention it—yet all day long the thing was uppermost +in the mind of each and mingled with it a similar picture with +himself as victim should they fail to make Fort Dinosaur before +dark.</p> +<p>And so they plunged forward at reckless speed, their clothes, +their hands, their faces torn by the retarding underbrush that +reached forth to hinder them. Again and again they fell; but be it +to their credit that the one always waited and helped the other and +that into the mind of neither entered the thought or the temptation +to desert his companion—they would reach the fort together if +both survived, or neither would reach it.</p> +<p>They encountered the usual number of savage beasts and reptiles; +but they met them with a courageous recklessness born of +desperation, and by virtue of the very madness of the chances they +took, they came through unscathed and with the minimum of +delay.</p> +<p>Shortly after noon they reached the end of the plateau. Before +them was a drop of two hundred feet to the valley beneath. To the +left, in the distance, they could see the waters of the great +inland sea that covers a considerable portion of the area of the +crater island of Caprona and at a little lesser distance to the +south of the cliffs they saw a thin spiral of smoke arising above +the tree-tops.</p> +<p>The landscape was familiar—each recognized it immediately +and knew that that smoky column marked the spot where Dinosaur had +stood. Was the fort still there, or did the smoke arise from the +smoldering embers of the building they had helped to fashion for +the housing of their party? Who could say!</p> +<p>Thirty precious minutes that seemed as many hours to the +impatient men were consumed in locating a precarious way from the +summit to the base of the cliffs that bounded the plateau upon the +south, and then once again they struck off upon level ground toward +their goal. The closer they approached the fort the greater became +their apprehension that all would not be well. They pictured the +barracks deserted or the small company massacred and the buildings +in ashes. It was almost in a frenzy of fear that they broke through +the final fringe of jungle and stood at last upon the verge of the +open meadow a half-mile from Fort Dinosaur.</p> +<p>“Lord!” ejaculated Sinclair. “They are still +there!” And he fell to his knees, sobbing.</p> +<p>Brady trembled like a leaf as he crossed himself and gave silent +thanks, for there before them stood the sturdy ramparts of Dinosaur +and from inside the inclosure rose a thin spiral of smoke that +marked the location of the cook-house. All was well, then, and +their comrades were preparing the evening meal!</p> +<p>Across the clearing they raced as though they had not already +covered in a single day a trackless, primeval country that might +easily have required two days by fresh and untired men. Within +hailing distance they set up such a loud shouting that presently +heads appeared above the top of the parapet and soon answering +shouts were rising from within Fort Dinosaur. A moment later three +men issued from the inclosure and came forward to meet the +survivors and listen to the hurried story of the eleven eventful +days since they had set out upon their expedition to the barrier +cliffs. They heard of the deaths of Tippet and James and of the +disappearance of Lieutenant Bradley, and a new terror settled upon +Dinosaur.</p> +<p>Olson, the Irish engineer, with Whitely and Wilson constituted +the remnants of Dinosaur’s defenders, and to Brady and +Sinclair they narrated the salient events that had transpired since +Bradley and his party had marched away on September 4th. They told +them of the infamous act of Baron Friedrich von Schoenvorts and his +German crew who had stolen the U-33, breaking their parole, and +steaming away toward the subterranean opening through the barrier +cliffs that carried the waters of the inland sea into the open +Pacific beyond; and of the cowardly shelling of the fort.</p> +<p>They told of the disappearance of Miss La Rue in the night of +September 11th, and of the departure of Bowen Tyler in search of +her, accompanied only by his Airedale, Nobs. Thus of the original +party of eleven Allies and nine Germans that had constituted the +company of the U-33 when she left English waters after her capture +by the crew of the English tug there were but five now to be +accounted for at Fort Dinosaur. Benson, Tippet, James, and one of +the Germans were known to be dead. It was assumed that Bradley, +Tyler and the girl had already succumbed to some of the savage +denizens of Caspak, while the fate of the Germans was equally +unknown, though it might readily be believed that they had made +good their escape. They had had ample time to provision the ship +and the refining of the crude oil they had discovered north of the +fort could have insured them an ample supply to carry them back to +Germany.</p> +<h3><a id="Ch_2" name="Ch_2"></a>Chapter 2</h3> +<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of +Contents</a></p> +<p>When bradley went on guard at midnight, September 14th, his +thoughts were largely occupied with rejoicing that the night was +almost spent without serious mishap and that the morrow would +doubtless see them all safely returned to Fort Dinosaur. The +hopefulness of his mood was tinged with sorrow by recollection of +the two members of his party who lay back there in the savage +wilderness and for whom there would never again be a +homecoming.</p> +<p>No premonition of impending ill cast gloom over his +anticipations for the coming day, for Bradley was a man who, while +taking every precaution against possible danger, permitted no +gloomy forebodings to weigh down his spirit. When danger +threatened, he was prepared; but he was not forever courting +disaster, and so it was that when about one o’clock in the +morning of the fifteenth, he heard the dismal flapping of giant +wings overhead, he was neither surprised nor frightened but idly +prepared for an attack he had known might reasonably be +expected.</p> +<p>The sound seemed to come from the south, and presently, low +above the trees in that direction, the man made out a dim, shadowy +form circling slowly about. Bradley was a brave man, yet so keen +was the feeling of revulsion engendered by the sight and sound of +that grim, uncanny shape that he distinctly felt the gooseflesh +rise over the surface of his body, and it was with difficulty that +he refrained from following an instinctive urge to fire upon the +nocturnal intruder. Better, far better would it have been had he +given in to the insistent demand of his subconscious mentor; but +his almost fanatical obsession to save ammunition proved now his +undoing, for while his attention was riveted upon the thing +circling before him and while his ears were filled with the beating +of its wings, there swooped silently out of the black night behind +him another weird and ghostly shape. With its huge wings partly +closed for the dive and its white robe fluttering in its wake, the +apparition swooped down upon the Englishman.</p> +<p>So great was the force of the impact when the thing struck +Bradley between the shoulders that the man was half stunned. His +rifle flew from his grasp; he felt clawlike talons of great +strength seize him beneath his arms and sweep him off his feet; and +then the thing rose swiftly with him, so swiftly that his cap was +blown from his head by the rush of air as he was borne rapidly +upward into the inky sky and the cry of warning to his companions +was forced back into his lungs.</p> +<p>The creature wheeled immediately toward the east and was at once +joined by its fellow, who circled them once and then fell in behind +them. Bradley now realized the strategy that the pair had used to +capture him and at once concluded that he was in the power of +reasoning beings closely related to the human race if not actually +of it.</p> +<p>Past experience suggested that the great wings were a part of +some ingenious mechanical device, for the limitations of the human +mind, which is always loath to accept aught beyond its own little +experience, would not permit him to entertain the idea that the +creatures might be naturally winged and at the same time of human +origin. From his position Bradley could not see the wings of his +captor, nor in the darkness had he been able to examine those of +the second creature closely when it circled before him. He listened +for the puff of a motor or some other telltale sound that would +prove the correctness of his theory. However, he was rewarded with +nothing more than the constant flap-flap.</p> +<p>Presently, far below and ahead, he saw the waters of the inland +sea, and a moment later he was borne over them. Then his captor did +that which proved beyond doubt to Bradley that he was in the hands +of human beings who had devised an almost perfect scheme of +duplicating, mechanically, the wings of a bird—the thing +spoke to its companion and in a language that Bradley partially +understood, since he recognized words that he had learned from the +savage races of Caspak. From this he judged that they were human, +and being human, he knew that they could have no natural +wings—for who had ever seen a human being so adorned! +Therefore their wings must be mechanical. Thus Bradley +reasoned— thus most of us reason; not by what might be +possible; but by what has fallen within the range of our +experience.</p> +<p>What he heard them say was to the effect that having covered +half the distance the burden would now be transferred from one to +the other. Bradley wondered how the exchange was to be +accomplished. He knew that those giant wings would not permit the +creatures to approach one another closely enough to effect the +transfer in this manner; but he was soon to discover that they had +other means of doing it.</p> +<p>He felt the thing that carried him rise to a greater altitude, +and below he glimpsed momentarily the second white-robed figure; +then the creature above sounded a low call, it was answered from +below, and instantly Bradley felt the clutching talons release him; +gasping for breath, he hurtled downward through space.</p> +<p>For a terrifying instant, pregnant with horror, Bradley fell; +then something swooped for him from behind, another pair of talons +clutched him beneath the arms, his downward rush was checked, +within another hundred feet, and close to the surface of the sea he +was again borne upward. As a hawk dives for a songbird on the wing, +so this great, human bird dived for Bradley. It was a harrowing +experience, but soon over, and once again the captive was being +carried swiftly toward the east and what fate he could not even +guess.</p> +<p>It was immediately following his transfer in mid-air that +Bradley made out the shadowy form of a large island far ahead, and +not long after, he realized that this must be the intended +destination of his captors. Nor was he mistaken. Three quarters of +an hour from the time of his seizure his captors dropped gently to +earth in the strangest city that human eye had ever rested upon. +Just a brief glimpse of his immediate surroundings vouchsafed +Bradley before he was whisked into the interior of one of the +buildings; but in that momentary glance he saw strange piles of +stone and wood and mud fashioned into buildings of all conceivable +sizes and shapes, sometimes piled high on top of one another, +sometimes standing alone in an open court-way, but usually crowded +and jammed together, so that there were no streets or alleys +between them other than a few which ended almost as soon as they +began. The principal doorways appeared to be in the roofs, and it +was through one of these that Bradley was inducted into the dark +interior of a low-ceiled room. Here he was pushed roughly into a +corner where he tripped over a thick mat, and there his captors +left him. He heard them moving about in the darkness for a moment, +and several times he saw their large luminous eyes glowing in the +dark. Finally, these disappeared and silence reigned, broken only +by the breathing of the creature which indicated to the Englishman +that they were sleeping somewhere in the same apartment.</p> +<p>It was now evident that the mat upon the floor was intended for +sleeping purposes and that the rough shove that had sent him to it +had been a rude invitation to repose. After taking stock of himself +and finding that he still had his pistol and ammunition, some +matches, a little tobacco, a canteen full of water and a razor, +Bradley made himself comfortable upon the mat and was soon asleep, +knowing that an attempted escape in the darkness without knowledge +of his surroundings would be predoomed to failure.</p> +<p>When he awoke, it was broad daylight, and the sight that met his +eyes made him rub them again and again to assure himself that they +were really open and that he was not dreaming. A broad shaft of +morning light poured through the open doorway in the ceiling of the +room which was about thirty feet square, or roughly square, being +irregular in shape, one side curving outward, another being +indented by what might have been the corner of another building +jutting into it, another alcoved by three sides of an octagon, +while the fourth was serpentine in contour. Two windows let in more +daylight, while two doors evidently gave ingress to other rooms. +The walls were partially ceiled with thin strips of wood, nicely +fitted and finished, partially plastered and the rest covered with +a fine, woven cloth. Figures of reptiles and beasts were painted +without regard to any uniform scheme here and there upon the walls. +A striking feature of the decorations consisted of several engaged +columns set into the walls at no regular intervals, the capitals of +each supporting a human skull the cranium of which touched the +ceiling, as though the latter was supported by these grim reminders +either of departed relatives or of some hideous tribal +rite—Bradley could not but wonder which.</p> +<p>Yet it was none of these things that filled him with greatest +wonder—no, it was the figures of the two creatures that had +captured him and brought him hither. At one end of the room a stout +pole about two inches in diameter ran horizontally from wall to +wall some six or seven feet from the floor, its ends securely set +in two of the columns. Hanging by their knees from this perch, +their heads downward and their bodies wrapped in their huge wings, +slept the creatures of the night before—like two great, +horrid bats they hung, asleep.</p> +<p>As Bradley gazed upon them in wide-eyed astonishment, he saw +plainly that all his intelligence, all his acquired knowledge +through years of observation and experience were set at naught by +the simple evidence of the fact that stood out glaringly before his +eyes—the creatures’ wings were not mechanical devices +but as natural appendages, growing from their shoulderblades, as +were their arms and legs. He saw, too, that except for their wings +the pair bore a strong resemblance to human beings, though +fashioned in a most grotesque mold.</p> +<p>As he sat gazing at them, one of the two awoke, separated his +wings to release his arms that had been folded across his breast, +placed his hands upon the floor, dropped his feet and stood erect. +For a moment he stretched his great wings slowly, solemnly blinking +his large round eyes. Then his gaze fell upon Bradley. The thin +lips drew back tightly against yellow teeth in a grimace that was +nothing but hideous. It could not have been termed a smile, and +what emotion it registered the Englishman was at a loss to guess. +No expression whatever altered the steady gaze of those large, +round eyes; there was no color upon the pasty, sunken cheeks. A +death’s head grimaced as though a man long dead raised his +parchment-covered skull from an old grave.</p> +<p>The creature stood about the height of an average man but +appeared much taller from the fact that the joints of his long +wings rose fully a foot above his hairless head. The bare arms were +long and sinewy, ending in strong, bony hands with clawlike +fingers—almost talonlike in their suggestiveness. The white +robe was separated in front, revealing skinny legs and the further +fact that the thing wore but the single garment, which was of fine, +woven cloth. From crown to sole the portions of the body exposed +were entirely hairless, and as he noted this, Bradley also noted +for the first time the cause of much of the seeming +expressionlessness of the creature’s countenance—it had +neither eye-brows or lashes. The ears were small and rested flat +against the skull, which was noticeably round, though the face was +quite flat. The creature had small feet, beautifully arched and +plump, but so out of keeping with every other physical attribute it +possessed as to appear ridiculous.</p> +<p>After eyeing Bradley for a moment the thing approached him. +“Where from?” it asked.</p> +<p>“England,” replied Bradley, as briefly.</p> +<p>“Where is England and what?” pursued the +questioner.</p> +<p>“It is a country far from here,” answered the +Englishman.</p> +<p>“Are your people cor-sva-jo or cos-ata-lu?”</p> +<p>“I do not understand you,” said Bradley; “and +now suppose you answer a few questions. Who are you? What country +is this? Why did you bring me here?”</p> +<p>Again the sepulchral grimace. “We are Wieroos—Luata +is our father. Caspak is ours. This, our country, is called Oo-oh. +We brought you here for (literally) Him Who Speaks for Luata to +gaze upon and question. He would know from whence you came and why; +but principally if you be cos-ata-lu.”</p> +<p>“And if I am not cos—whatever you call the +bloomin’ beast— what of it?”</p> +<p>The Wieroo raised his wings in a very human shrug and waved his +bony claws toward the human skulls supporting the ceiling. His +gesture was eloquent; but he embellished it by remarking, +“And possibly if you are.”</p> +<p>“I’m hungry,” snapped Bradley.</p> +<p>The Wieroo motioned him to one of the doors which he threw open, +permitting Bradley to pass out onto another roof on a level lower +than that upon which they had landed earlier in the morning. By +daylight the city appeared even more remarkable than in the +moonlight, though less weird and unreal. The houses of all shapes +and sizes were piled about as a child might pile blocks of various +forms and colors. He saw now that there were what might be called +streets or alleys, but they ran in baffling turns and twists, nor +ever reached a destination, always ending in a dead wall where some +Wieroo had built a house across them.</p> +<p>Upon each house was a slender column supporting a human skull. +Sometimes the columns were at one corner of the roof, sometimes at +another, or again they rose from the center or near the center, and +the columns were of varying heights, from that of a man to those +which rose twenty feet above their roofs. The skulls were, as a +rule, painted—blue or white, or in combinations of both +colors. The most effective were painted blue with the teeth white +and the eye-sockets rimmed with white.</p> +<p>There were other skulls—thousands of them—tens, +hundreds of thousands. They rimmed the eaves of every house, they +were set in the plaster of the outer walls and at no great distance +from where Bradley stood rose a round tower built entirely of human +skulls. And the city extended in every direction as far as the +Englishman could see.</p> +<p>All about him Wieroos were moving across the roofs or winging +through the air. The sad sound of their flapping wings rose and +fell like a solemn dirge. Most of them were appareled all in white, +like his captors; but others had markings of red or blue or yellow +slashed across the front of their robes.</p> +<p>His guide pointed toward a doorway in an alley below them. +“Go there and eat,” he commanded, “and then come +back. You cannot escape. If any question you, say that you belong +to Fosh-bal-soj. There is the way.” And this time he pointed +to the top of a ladder which protruded above the eaves of the roof +near-by. Then he turned and reentered the house.</p> +<p>Bradley looked about him. No, he could not escape—that +seemed evident. The city appeared interminable, and beyond the +city, if not a savage wilderness filled with wild beasts, there was +the broad inland sea infested with horrid monsters. No wonder his +captor felt safe in turning him loose in Oo-oh—he wondered if +that was the name of the country or the city and if there were +other cities like this upon the island.</p> +<p>Slowly he descended the ladder to the seemingly deserted alley +which was paved with what appeared to be large, round cobblestones. +He looked again at the smooth, worn pavement, and a rueful grin +crossed his features—the alley was paved with skulls. +“The City of Human Skulls,” mused Bradley. “They +must have been collectin’ ‘em since Adam,” he +thought, and then he crossed and entered the building through the +doorway that had been pointed out to him.</p> +<p>Inside he found a large room in which were many Wieroos seated +before pedestals the tops of which were hollowed out so that they +resembled the ordinary bird drinking- and bathing-fonts so commonly +seen on suburban lawns. A seat protruded from each of the four +sides of the pedestals—just a flat board with a support +running from its outer end diagonally to the base of the +pedestal.</p> +<p>As Bradley entered, some of the Wieroos espied him, and a dismal +wail arose. Whether it was a greeting or a threat, Bradley did not +know. Suddenly from a dark alcove another Wieroo rushed out toward +him. “Who are you?” he cried. “What do you +want?”</p> +<p>“Fosh-bal-soj sent me here to eat,” replied +Bradley.</p> +<p>“Do you belong to Fosh-bal-soj?” asked the +other.</p> +<p>“That appears to be what he thinks,” answered the +Englishman.</p> +<p>“Are you cos-ata-lu?” demanded the Wieroo.</p> +<p>“Give me something to eat or I’ll be all of +that,” replied Bradley.</p> +<p>The Wieroo looked puzzled. “Sit here, jaal-lu,” he +snapped, and Bradley sat down unconscious of the fact that he had +been insulted by being called a hyena-man, an appellation of +contempt in Caspak.</p> +<p>The Wieroo had seated him at a pedestal by himself, and as he +sat waiting for what was next to transpire, he looked about him at +the Wieroo in his immediate vicinity. He saw that in each font was +a quantity of food, and that each Wieroo was armed with a wooden +skewer, sharpened at one end; with which they carried solid +portions of food to their mouths. At the other end of the skewer +was fastened a small clam-shell. This was used to scoop up the +smaller and softer portions of the repast into which all four of +the occupants of each table dipped impartially. The Wieroo leaned +far over their food, scooping it up rapidly and with much noise, +and so great was their haste that a part of each mouthful always +fell back into the common dish; and when they choked, by reason of +the rapidity with which they attempted to bolt their food, they +often lost it all. Bradley was glad that he had a pedestal all to +himself.</p> +<p>Soon the keeper of the place returned with a wooden bowl filled +with food. This he dumped into Bradley’s +“trough,” as he already thought of it. The Englishman +was glad that he could not see into the dark alcove or know what +were all the ingredients that constituted the mess before him, for +he was very hungry.</p> +<p>After the first mouthful he cared even less to investigate the +antecedents of the dish, for he found it peculiarly palatable. It +seemed to consist of a combination of meat, fruits, vegetables, +small fish and other undistinguishable articles of food all +seasoned to produce a gastronomic effect that was at once baffling +and delicious.</p> +<p>When he had finished, his trough was empty, and then he +commenced to wonder who was to settle for his meal. As he waited +for the proprietor to return, he fell to examining the dish from +which he had eaten and the pedestal upon which it rested. The font +was of stone worn smooth by long-continued use, the four outer +edges hollowed and polished by the contact of the countless Wieroo +bodies that had leaned against them for how long a period of time +Bradley could not even guess. Everything about the place carried +the impression of hoary age. The carved pedestals were black with +use, the wooden seats were worn hollow, the floor of stone slabs +was polished by the contact of possibly millions of naked feet and +worn away in the aisles between the pedestals so that the latter +rested upon little mounds of stone several inches above the general +level of the floor.</p> +<p>Finally, seeing that no one came to collect, Bradley arose and +started for the doorway. He had covered half the distance when he +heard the voice of mine host calling to him: “Come back, +jaal-lu,” screamed the Wieroo; and Bradley did as he was bid. +As he approached the creature which stood now behind a large, +flat-topped pedestal beside the alcove, he saw lying upon the +smooth surface something that almost elicited a gasp of +astonishment from him—a simple, common thing it was, or would +have been almost anywhere in the world but Caspak—a square +bit of paper!</p> +<p>And on it, in a fine hand, written compactly, were many strange +hieroglyphics! These remarkable creatures, then, had a written as +well as a spoken language and besides the art of weaving cloth +possessed that of paper-making. Could it be that such grotesque +beings represented the high culture of the human race within the +boundaries of Caspak? Had natural selection produced during the +countless ages of Caspakian life a winged monstrosity that +represented the earthly pinnacle of man’s evolution?</p> +<p>Bradley had noted something of the obvious indications of a +gradual evolution from ape to spearman as exemplified by the +several overlapping races of Alalus, club-men and hatchet-men that +formed the connecting links between the two extremes with which he, +had come in contact. He had heard of the Krolus and the +Galus—reputed to be still higher in the plane of +evolution— and now he had indisputable evidence of a race +possessing refinements of civilization eons in advance of the +spear-men. The conjectures awakened by even a momentary +consideration of the possibilities involved became at once as +wildly bizarre as the insane imagings of a drug addict.</p> +<p>As these thoughts flashed through his mind, the Wieroo held out +a pen of bone fixed to a wooden holder and at the same time made a +sign that Bradley was to write upon the paper. It was difficult to +judge from the expressionless features of the Wieroo what was +passing in the creature’s mind, but Bradley could not but +feel that the thing cast a supercilious glance upon him as much as +to say, “Of course you do not know how to write, you poor, +low creature; but you can make your mark.”</p> +<p>Bradley seized the pen and in a clear, bold hand wrote: +“John Bradley, England.” The Wieroo showed evidences of +consternation as it seized the piece of paper and examined the +writing with every mark of incredulity and surprise. Of course it +could make nothing of the strange characters; but it evidently +accepted them as proof that Bradley possessed knowledge of a +written language of his own, for following the Englishman’s +entry it made a few characters of its own.</p> +<p>“You will come here again just before Lua hides his face +behind the great cliff,” announced the creature, +“unless before that you are summoned by Him Who Speaks for +Luata, in which case you will not have to eat any more.”</p> +<p>“Reassuring cuss,” thought Bradley as he turned and +left the building.</p> +<p>Outside were several Wieroos that had been eating at the +pedestals within. They immediately surrounded him, asking all sorts +of questions, plucking at his garments, his ammunition-belt and his +pistol. Their demeanor was entirely different from what it had been +within the eating-place and Bradley was to learn that a house of +food was sanctuary for him, since the stern laws of the Wieroos +forbade altercations within such walls. Now they were rough and +threatening, as with wings half spread they hovered about him in +menacing attitudes, barring his way to the ladder leading to the +roof from whence he had descended; but the Englishman was not one +to brook interference for long. He attempted at first to push his +way past them, and then when one seized his arm and jerked him +roughly back, Bradley swung upon the creature and with a heavy blow +to the jaw felled it.</p> +<p>Instantly pandemonium reigned. Loud wails arose, great wings +opened and closed with a loud, beating noise and many clawlike +hands reached forth to clutch him. Bradley struck to right and +left. He dared not use his pistol for fear that once they +discovered its power he would be overcome by weight of numbers and +relieved of possession of what he considered his trump card, to be +reserved until the last moment that it might be used to aid in his +escape, for already the Englishman was planning, though almost +hopelessly, such an attempt.</p> +<p>A few blows convinced Bradley that the Wieroos were arrant +cowards and that they bore no weapons, for after two or three had +fallen beneath his fists the others formed a circle about him, but +at a safe distance and contented themselves with threatening and +blustering, while those whom he had felled lay upon the pavement +without trying to arise, the while they moaned and wailed in +lugubrious chorus.</p> +<p>Again Bradley strode toward the ladder, and this time the circle +parted before him; but no sooner had he ascended a few rungs than +he was seized by one foot and an effort made to drag him down. With +a quick backward glance the Englishman, clinging firmly to the +ladder with both hands, drew up his free foot and with all the +strength of a powerful leg, planted a heavy shoe squarely in the +flat face of the Wieroo that held him. Shrieking horribly, the +creature clapped both hands to its face and sank to the ground +while Bradley clambered quickly the remaining distance to the roof, +though no sooner did he reach the top of the ladder than a great +flapping of wings beneath him warned him that the Wieroos were +rising after him. A moment later they swarmed about his head as he +ran for the apartment in which he had spent the early hours of the +morning after his arrival.</p> +<p>It was but a short distance from the top of the ladder to the +doorway, and Bradley had almost reached his goal when the door flew +open and Fosh-bal-soj stepped out. Immediately the pursuing Wieroos +demanded punishment of the jaal-lu who had so grievously maltreated +them. Fosh-bal-soj listened to their complaints and then with a +sudden sweep of his right hand seized Bradley by the scruff of the +neck and hurled him sprawling through the doorway upon the floor of +the chamber.</p> +<p>So sudden was the assault and so surprising the strength of the +Wieroo that the Englishman was taken completely off his guard. When +he arose, the door was closed, and Fosh-bal-soj was standing over +him, his hideous face contorted into an expression of rage and +hatred.</p> +<p>“Hyena, snake, lizard!” he screamed. “You +would dare lay your low, vile, profaning hands upon even the +lowliest of the Wieroos— the sacred chosen of +Luata!”</p> +<p>Bradley was mad, and so he spoke in a very low, calm voice while +a half-smile played across his lips but his cold, gray eyes were +unsmiling.</p> +<p>“What you did to me just now,” he said, +“—I am going to kill you for that,” and even as +he spoke, he launched himself at the throat of Fosh-bal-soj. The +other Wieroo that had been asleep when Bradley left the chamber had +departed, and the two were alone. Fosh-bal-soj displayed little of +the cowardice of those that had attacked Bradley in the alleyway, +but that may have been because he had so slight opportunity, for +Bradley had him by the throat before he could utter a cry and with +his right hand struck him heavily and repeatedly upon his face and +over his heart—ugly, smashing, short-arm jabs of the sort +that take the fight out of a man in quick time.</p> +<p>But Fosh-bal-soj was of no mind to die passively. He clawed and +struck at Bradley while with his great wings he attempted to shield +himself from the merciless rain of blows, at the same time +searching for a hold upon his antagonist’s throat. Presently +he succeeded in tripping the Englishman, and together the two fell +heavily to the floor, Bradley underneath, and at the same instant +the Wieroo fastened his long talons about the other’s +windpipe.</p> +<p>Fosh-bal-soj was possessed of enormous strength and he was +fighting for his life. The Englishman soon realized that the battle +was going against him. Already his lungs were pounding painfully +for air as he reached for his pistol. It was with difficulty that +he drew it from its holster, and even then, with death staring him +in the face, he thought of his precious ammunition. +“Can’t waste it,” he thought; and slipping his +fingers to the barrel he raised the weapon and struck Fosh-bal-soj +a terrific blow between the eyes. Instantly the clawlike fingers +released their hold, and the creature sank limply to the floor +beside Bradley, who lay for several minutes gasping painfully in an +effort to regain his breath.</p> +<p>When he was able, he rose, and leaned close over the Wieroo, +lying silent and motionless, his wings dropping limply and his +great, round eyes staring blankly toward the ceiling. A brief +examination convinced Bradley that the thing was dead, and with the +conviction came an overwhelming sense of the dangers which must now +confront him; but how was he to escape?</p> +<p>His first thought was to find some means for concealing the +evidence of his deed and then to make a bold effort to escape. +Stepping to the second door he pushed it gently open and peered in +upon what seemed to be a store room. In it was a litter of cloth +such as the Wieroos’ robes were fashioned from, a number of +chests painted blue and white, with white hieroglyphics painted in +bold strokes upon the blue and blue hieroglyphics upon the white. +In one corner was a pile of human skulls reaching almost to the +ceiling and in another a stack of dried Wieroo wings. The chamber +was as irregularly shaped as the other and had but a single window +and a second door at the further end, but was without the exit +through the roof and, most important of all, there was no creature +of any sort in it.</p> +<p>As quickly as possible Bradley dragged the dead Wieroo through +the doorway and closed the door; then he looked about for a place +to conceal the corpse. One of the chests was large enough to hold +the body if the knees were bent well up, and with this idea in view +Bradley approached the chest to open it. The lid was made in two +pieces, each being hinged at an opposite end of the chest and +joining nicely where they met in the center of the chest, making a +snug, well-fitting joint. There was no lock. Bradley raised one +half the cover and looked in. With a smothered “By +Jove!” he bent closer to examine the contents—the chest +was about half filled with an assortment of golden trinkets. There +were what appeared to be bracelets, anklets and brooches of virgin +gold.</p> +<p>Realizing that there was no room in the chest for the body of +the Wieroo, Bradley turned to seek another means of concealing the +evidence of his crime. There was a space between the chests and the +wall, and into this he forced the corpse, piling the discarded +robes upon it until it was entirely hidden from sight; but now how +was he to make good his escape in the bright glare of that early +Spring day?</p> +<p>He walked to the door at the far end of the apartment and +cautiously opened it an inch. Before him and about two feet away +was the blank wall of another building. Bradley opened the door a +little farther and looked in both directions. There was no one in +sight to the left over a considerable expanse of roof-top, and to +the right another building shut off his line of vision at about +twenty feet. Slipping out, he turned to the right and in a few +steps found a narrow passageway between two buildings. Turning into +this he passed about half its length when he saw a Wieroo appear at +the opposite end and halt. The creature was not looking down the +passageway; but at any moment it might turn its eyes toward him, +when he would be immediately discovered.</p> +<p>To Bradley’s left was a triangular niche in the wall of +one of the houses and into this he dodged, thus concealing himself +from the sight of the Wieroo. Beside him was a door painted a vivid +yellow and constructed after the same fashion as the other Wieroo +doors he had seen, being made up of countless narrow strips of wood +from four to six inches in length laid on in patches of about the +same width, the strips in adjacent patches never running in the +same direction. The result bore some resemblance to a crazy +patchwork quilt, which was heightened when, as in one of the doors +he had seen, contiguous patches were painted different colors. The +strips appeared to have been bound together and to the underlying +framework of the door with gut or fiber and also glued, after which +a thick coating of paint had been applied. One edge of the door was +formed of a straight, round pole about two inches in diameter that +protruded at top and bottom, the projections setting in round holes +in both lintel and sill forming the axis upon which the door swung. +An eccentric disk upon the inside face of the door engaged a slot +in the frame when it was desired to secure the door against +intruders.</p> +<p>As Bradley stood flattened against the wall waiting for the +Wieroo to move on, he heard the creature’s wings brushing +against the sides of the buildings as it made its way down the +narrow passage in his direction. As the yellow door offered the +only means of escape without detection, the Englishman decided to +risk whatever might lie beyond it, and so, boldly pushing it in, he +crossed the threshold and entered a small apartment.</p> +<p>As he did so, he heard a muffled ejaculation of surprise, and +turning his eyes in the direction from whence the sound had come, +he beheld a wide-eyed girl standing flattened against the opposite +wall, an expression of incredulity upon her face. At a glance he +saw that she was of no race of humans that he had come in contact +with since his arrival upon Caprona—there was no trace about +her form or features of any relationship to those low orders of +men, nor was she appareled as they—or, rather, she did not +entirely lack apparel as did most of them.</p> +<p>A soft hide fell from her left shoulder to just below her left +hip on one side and almost to her right knee on the other, a loose +girdle was about her waist, and golden ornaments such as he had +seen in the blue-and-white chest encircled her arms and legs, while +a golden fillet with a triangular diadem bound her heavy hair above +her brows. Her skin was white as from long confinement within +doors; but it was clear and fine. Her figure, but partially +concealed by the soft deerskin, was all curves of symmetry and +youthful grace, while her features might easily have been the envy +of the most feted of Continental beauties.</p> +<p>If the girl was surprised by the sudden appearance of Bradley, +the latter was absolutely astounded to discover so wondrous a +creature among the hideous inhabitants of the City of Human Skulls. +For a moment the two looked at one another in unconcealed +consternation, and then Bradley spoke, using to the best of his +poor ability, the common tongue of Caspak.</p> +<p>“Who are you,” he asked, “and from where do +you come? Do not tell me that you are a Wieroo.”</p> +<p>“No,” she replied, “I am no Wieroo.” And +she shuddered slightly as she pronounced the word. “I am a +Galu; but who and what are you? I am sure that you are no Galu, +from your garments; but you are like the Galus in other respects. I +know that you are not of this frightful city, for I have been here +for almost ten moons, and never have I seen a male Galu brought +hither before, nor are there such as you and I, other than +prisoners in the land of Oo-oh, and these are all females. Are you +a prisoner, then?”</p> +<p>He told her briefly who and what he was, though he doubted if +she understood, and from her he learned that she had been a +prisoner there for many months; but for what purpose he did not +then learn, as in the midst of their conversation the yellow door +swung open and a Wieroo with a robe slashed with yellow +entered.</p> +<p>At sight of Bradley the creature became furious. “Whence +came this reptile?” it demanded of the girl. “How long +has it been here with you?”</p> +<p>“It came through the doorway just ahead of you,” +Bradley answered for the girl.</p> +<p>The Wieroo looked relieved. “It is well for the girl that +this is so,” it said, “for now only you will have to +die.” And stepping to the door the creature raised its voice +in one of those uncanny, depressing wails.</p> +<p>The Englishman looked toward the girl. “Shall I kill +it?” he asked, half drawing his pistol. “What is best +to do?—I do not wish to endanger you.”</p> +<p>The Wieroo backed toward the door. “Defiler!” it +screamed. “You dare to threaten one of the sacred chosen of +Luata!”</p> +<p>“Do not kill him,” cried the girl, “for then +there could be no hope for you. That you are here, alive, shows +that they may not intend to kill you at all, and so there is a +chance for you if you do not anger them; but touch him in violence +and your bleached skull will top the loftiest pedestal of +Oo-oh.”</p> +<p>“And what of you?” asked Bradley.</p> +<p>“I am already doomed,” replied the girl; “I am +cos-ata-lo.”</p> +<p>“Cos-ata-lo! cos-ata-lu!” What did these phrases +mean that they were so oft repeated by the denizens of Oo-oh? Lu +and lo, Bradley knew to mean man and woman; ata; was employed +variously to indicate life, eggs, young, reproduction and kindred +subject; cos was a negative; but in combination they were +meaningless to the European.</p> +<p>“Do you mean they will kill you?” asked Bradley.</p> +<p>“I but wish that they would,” replied the girl. +“My fate is to be worse than death—in just a few nights +more, with the coming of the new moon.”</p> +<p>“Poor she-snake!” snapped the Wieroo. “You are +to become sacred above all other shes. He Who Speaks for Luata has +chosen you for himself. Today you go to his temple—“the +Wieroo used a phrase meaning literally High +Place—“where you will receive the sacred +commands.”</p> +<p>The girl shuddered and cast a sorrowful glance toward Bradley. +“Ah,” she sighed, “if I could but see my beloved +country once again!”</p> +<p>The man stepped suddenly close to her side before the Wieroo +could interpose and in a low voice asked her if there was no way by +which he might encompass her escape. She shook her head +sorrowfully. “Even if we escaped the city,” she +replied, “there is the big water between the island of Oo-oh +and the Galu shore.”</p> +<p>“And what is beyond the city, if we could leave it?” +pursued Bradley.</p> +<p>“I may only guess from what I have heard since I was +brought here,” she answered; “but by reports and chance +remarks I take it to be a beautiful land in which there are but few +wild beasts and no men, for only the Wieroos live upon this island +and they dwell always in cities of which there are three, this +being the largest. The others are at the far end of the island, +which is about three marches from end to end and at its widest +point about one march.”</p> +<p>From his own experience and from what the natives on the +mainland had told him, Bradley knew that ten miles was a good +day’s march in Caspak, owing to the fact that at most points +it was a trackless wilderness and at all times travelers were beset +by hideous beasts and reptiles that greatly impeded rapid +progress.</p> +<p>The two had spoken rapidly but were now interrupted by the +advent through the opening in the roof of several Wieroos who had +come in answer to the alarm it of the yellow slashing had +uttered.</p> +<p>“This jaal-lu,” cried the offended one, “has +threatened me. Take its hatchet from it and make it fast where it +can do no harm until He Who Speaks for Luata has said what shall be +done with it. It is one of those strange creatures that +Fosh-bal-soj discovered first above the Band-lu country and +followed back toward the beginning. He Who Speaks for Luata sent +Fosh-bal-soj to fetch him one of the creatures, and here it is. It +is hoped that it may be from another world and hold the secret of +the cos-ata-lus.”</p> +<p>The Wieroos approached boldly to take Bradley’s +“hatchet” from him, their leader having indicated the +pistol hanging in its holster at the Englishman’s hip, but +the first one went reeling backward against his fellows from the +blow to the chin which Bradley followed up with a rush and the +intention to clean up the room in record time; but he had reckoned +without the opening in the roof. Two were down and a great wailing +and moaning was arising when reinforcements appeared from above. +Bradley did not see them; but the girl did, and though she cried +out a warning, it came too late for him to avoid a large Wieroo who +dived headforemost for him, striking him between the shoulders and +bearing him to the floor. Instantly a dozen more were piling on top +of him. His pistol was wrenched from its holster and he was +securely pinioned down by the weight of numbers.</p> +<p>At a word from the Wieroo of the yellow slashing who evidently +was a person of authority, one left and presently returned with +fiber ropes with which Bradley was tightly bound.</p> +<p>“Now bear him to the Blue Place of Seven Skulls,” +directed the chief Wieroo, “and one take the word of all that +has passed to Him Who Speaks for Luata.”</p> +<p>Each of the creatures raised a hand, the back against its face, +as though in salute. One seized Bradley and carried him through the +yellow doorway to the roof from whence it rose upon its wide-spread +wings and flapped off across the roof-tops of Oo-oh with its heavy +burden clutched in its long talons.</p> +<p>Below him Bradley could see the city stretching away to a +distance on every hand. It was not as large as he had imagined, +though he judged that it was at least three miles square. The +houses were piled in indescribable heaps, sometimes to a height of +a hundred feet. The streets and alleys were short and crooked and +there were many areas where buildings had been wedged in so closely +that no light could possibly reach the lowest tiers, the entire +surface of the ground being packed solidly with them.</p> +<p>The colors were varied and startling, the architecture amazing. +Many roofs were cup or saucer-shaped with a small hole in the +center of each, as though they had been constructed to catch +rain-water and conduct it to a reservoir beneath; but nearly all +the others had the large opening in the top that Bradley had seen +used by these flying men in lieu of doorways. At all levels were +the myriad poles surmounted by grinning skulls; but the two most +prominent features of the city were the round tower of human skulls +that Bradley had noted earlier in the day and another and much +larger edifice near the center of the city. As they approached it, +Bradley saw that it was a huge building rising a hundred feet in +height from the ground and that it stood alone in the center of +what might have been called a plaza in some other part of the +world. Its various parts, however, were set together with the same +strange irregularity that marked the architecture of the city as a +whole; and it was capped by an enormous saucer-shaped roof which +projected far beyond the eaves, having the appearance of a colossal +Chinese coolie hat, inverted.</p> +<p>The Wieroo bearing Bradley passed over one corner of the open +space about the large building, revealing to the Englishman grass +and trees and running water beneath. They passed the building and +about five hundred yards beyond the creature alighted on the roof +of a square, blue building surmounted by seven poles bearing seven +skulls. This then, thought Bradley, is the Blue Place of Seven +Skulls.</p> +<p>Over the opening in the roof was a grated covering, and this the +Wieroo removed. The thing then tied a piece of fiber rope to one of +Bradley’s ankles and rolled him over the edge of the opening. +All was dark below and for an instant the Englishman came as near +to experiencing real terror as he had ever come in his life before. +As he rolled off into the black abyss he felt the rope tighten +about his ankle and an instant later he was stopped with a sudden +jerk to swing pendulumlike, head downward. Then the creature +lowered away until Bradley’s head came in sudden and painful +contact with the floor below, after which the Wieroo let loose of +the rope entirely and the Englishman’s body crashed to the +wooden planking. He felt the free end of the rope dropped upon him +and heard the grating being slid into place above him.</p> +<h3><a id="Ch_3" name="Ch_3"></a>Chapter 3</h3> +<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of +Contents</a></p> +<p>Half-stunned, Bradley lay for a minute as he had fallen and then +slowly and painfully wriggled into a less uncomfortable position. +He could see nothing of his surroundings in the gloom about him +until after a few minutes his eyes became accustomed to the dark +interior when he rolled them from side to side in survey of his +prison.</p> +<p>He discovered himself to be in a bare room which was windowless, +nor could he see any other opening than that through which he had +been lowered. In one corner was a huddled mass that might have been +almost anything from a bundle of rags to a dead body.</p> +<p>Almost immediately after he had taken his bearings Bradley +commenced working with his bonds. He was a man of powerful +physique, and as from the first he had been imbued with a belief +that the fiber ropes were too weak to hold him, he worked on with a +firm conviction that sooner or later they would part to his +strainings. After a matter of five minutes he was positive that the +strands about his wrists were beginning to give; but he was +compelled to rest then from exhaustion.</p> +<p>As he lay, his eyes rested upon the bundle in the corner, and +presently he could have sworn that the thing moved. With eyes +straining through the gloom the man lay watching the grim and +sinister thing in the corner. Perhaps his overwrought nerves were +playing a sorry joke upon him. He thought of this and also that his +condition of utter helplessness might still further have stimulated +his imagination. He closed his eyes and sought to relax his muscles +and his nerves; but when he looked again, he knew that he had not +been mistaken—the thing had moved; now it lay in a slightly +altered form and farther from the wall. It was nearer him.</p> +<p>With renewed strength Bradley strained at his bonds, his +fascinated gaze still glued upon the shapeless bundle. No longer +was there any doubt that it moved—he saw it rise in the +center several inches and then creep closer to him. It sank and +arose again—a headless, hideous, monstrous thing of menace. +Its very silence rendered it the more terrible.</p> +<p>Bradley was a brave man; ordinarily his nerves were of steel; +but to be at the mercy of some unknown and nameless horror, to be +unable to defend himself—it was these things that almost +unstrung him, for at best he was only human. To stand in the open, +even with the odds all against him; to be able to use his fists, to +put up some sort of defense, to inflict punishment upon his +adversary—then he could face death with a smile. It was not +death that he feared now—it was that horror of the unknown +that is part of the fiber of every son of woman.</p> +<p>Closer and closer came the shapeless mass. Bradley lay +motionless and listened. What was that he heard! Breathing? He +could not be mistaken—and then from out of the bundle of rags +issued a hollow groan. Bradley felt his hair rise upon his head. He +struggled with the slowly parting strands that held him. The thing +beside him rose up higher than before and the Englishman could have +sworn that he saw a single eye peering at him from among the +tumbled cloth. For a moment the bundle remained +motionless—only the sound of breathing issued from it, then +there broke from it a maniacal laugh.</p> +<p>Cold sweat stood upon Bradley’s brow as he tugged for +liberation. He saw the rags rise higher and higher above him until +at last they tumbled upon the floor from the body of a naked +man—a thin, a bony, a hideous caricature of man, that mouthed +and mummed and, wabbling upon its weak and shaking legs, crumpled +to the floor again, still laughing—laughing horribly.</p> +<p>It crawled toward Bradley. “Food! Food!” it +screamed. “There is a way out! There is a way out!”</p> +<p>Dragging itself to his side the creature slumped upon the +Englishman’s breast. “Food!” it shrilled as with +its bony fingers and its teeth, it sought the man’s bare +throat.</p> +<p>“Food! There is a way out!” Bradley felt teeth upon +his jugular. He turned and twisted, shaking himself free for an +instant; but once more with hideous persistence the thing fastened +itself upon him. The weak jaws were unable to send the dull teeth +through the victim’s flesh; but Bradley felt it pawing, +pawing, pawing, like a monstrous rat, seeking his life’s +blood.</p> +<p>The skinny arms now embraced his neck, holding the teeth to his +throat against all his efforts to dislodge the thing. Weak as it +was it had strength enough for this in its mad efforts to eat. +Mumbling as it worked, it repeated again and again, “Food! +Food! There is a way out!” until Bradley thought those two +expressions alone would drive him mad.</p> +<p>And all but mad he was as with a final effort backed by almost +maniacal strength he tore his wrists from the confining bonds and +grasping the repulsive thing upon his breast hurled it halfway +across the room. Panting like a spent hound Bradley worked at the +thongs about his ankles while the maniac lay quivering and mumbling +where it had fallen. Presently the Englishman leaped to his +feet—freer than he had ever before felt in all his life, +though he was still hopelessly a prisoner in the Blue Place of +Seven Skulls.</p> +<p>With his back against the wall for support, so weak the reaction +left him, Bradley stood watching the creature upon the floor. He +saw it move and slowly raise itself to its hands and knees, where +it swayed to and fro as its eyes roved about in search of him; and +when at last they found him, there broke from the drawn lips the +mumbled words: “Food! Food! There is a way out!” The +pitiful supplication in the tones touched the Englishman’s +heart. He knew that this could be no Wieroo, but possibly once a +man like himself who had been cast into this pit of solitary +confinement with this hideous result that might in time be his +fate, also.</p> +<p>And then, too, there was the suggestion of hope held out by the +constant reiteration of the phrase, “There is a way +out.” Was there a way out? What did this poor thing know?</p> +<p>“Who are you and how long have you been here?” +Bradley suddenly demanded.</p> +<p>For a moment the man upon the floor made no response, then +mumblingly came the words: “Food! Food!”</p> +<p>“Stop!” commanded the Englishman—the +injunction might have been barked from the muzzle of a pistol. It +brought the man to a sitting posture, his hands off the ground. He +stopped swaying to and fro and appeared to be startled into an +attempt to master his faculties of concentration and thought.</p> +<p>Bradley repeated his questions sharply.</p> +<p>“I am An-Tak, the Galu,” replied the man. +“Luata alone knows how long I have been here—maybe ten +moons, maybe ten moons three times”—it was the +Caspakian equivalent of thirty. “I was young and strong when +they brought me here. Now I am old and very weak. I am +cos-ata-lu—that is why they have not killed me. If I tell +them the secret of becoming cos-ata-lu they will take me out; but +how can I tell them that which Luata alone knows?</p> +<p>“What is cos-ata-lu?” demanded Bradley.</p> +<p>“Food! Food! There is a way out!” mumbled the +Galu.</p> +<p>Bradley strode across the floor, seized the man by his shoulders +and shook him.</p> +<p>“Tell me,” he cried, “what is +cos-ata-lu?”</p> +<p>“Food!” whimpered An-Tak.</p> +<p>Bradley bethought himself. His haversack had not been taken from +him. In it besides his razor and knife were odds and ends of +equipment and a small quantity of dried meat. He tossed a small +strip of the latter to the starving Galu. An-Tak seized upon it and +devoured it ravenously. It instilled new life in the man.</p> +<p>“What is cos-ata-lu?” insisted Bradley again.</p> +<p>An-Tak tried to explain. His narrative was often broken by +lapses of concentration during which he reverted to his plaintive +mumbling for food and recurrence to the statement that there was a +way out; but by firmness and patience the Englishman drew out +piece-meal a more or less lucid exposition of the remarkable scheme +of evolution that rules in Caspak. In it he found explanations of +the hitherto inexplicable. He discovered why he had seen no babes +or children among the Caspakian tribes with which he had come in +contact; why each more northerly tribe evinced a higher state of +development than those south of them; why each tribe included +individuals ranging in physical and mental characteristics from the +highest of the next lower race to the lowest of the next higher, +and why the women of each tribe immersed themselves morning for an +hour or more in the warm pools near which the habitations of their +people always were located; and, too, he discovered why those pools +were almost immune from the attacks of carnivorous animals and +reptiles.</p> +<p>He learned that all but those who were cos-ata-lu came up +cor-sva-jo, or from the beginning. The egg from which they first +developed into tadpole form was deposited, with millions of others, +in one of the warm pools and with it a poisonous serum that the +carnivora instinctively shunned. Down the warm stream from the pool +floated the countless billions of eggs and tadpoles, developing as +they drifted slowly toward the sea. Some became tadpoles in the +pool, some in the sluggish stream and some not until they reached +the great inland sea. In the next stage they became fishes or +reptiles, An-Tak was not positive which, and in this form, always +developing, they swam far to the south, where, amid the rank and +teeming jungles, some of them evolved into amphibians. Always there +were those whose development stopped at the first stage, others +whose development ceased when they became reptiles, while by far +the greater proportion formed the food supply of the ravenous +creatures of the deep.</p> +<p>Few indeed were those that eventually developed into baboons and +then apes, which was considered by Caspakians the real beginning of +evolution. From the egg, then, the individual developed slowly into +a higher form, just as the frog’s egg develops through +various stages from a fish with gills to a frog with lungs. With +that thought in mind Bradley discovered that it was not difficult +to believe in the possibility of such a scheme— there was +nothing new in it.</p> +<p>From the ape the individual, if it survived, slowly developed +into the lowest order of man—the Alu—and then by +degrees to Bo-lu, Sto-lu, Band-lu, Kro-lu and finally Galu. And in +each stage countless millions of other eggs were deposited in the +warm pools of the various races and floated down to the great sea +to go through a similar process of evolution outside the womb as +develops our own young within; but in Caspak the scheme is much +more inclusive, for it combines not only individual development but +the evolution of species and genera. If an egg survives it goes +through all the stages of development that man has passed through +during the unthinkable eons since life first moved upon the +earth’s face.</p> +<p>The final stage—that which the Galus have almost attained +and for which all hope—is cos-ata-lu, which literally, means +no-egg-man, or one who is born directly as are the young of the +outer world of mammals. Some of the Galus produce cos-ata-lu and +cos-ata-lo both; the Weiroos only cos-ata-lu—in other words +all Wieroos are born male, and so they prey upon the Galus for +their women and sometimes capture and torture the Galu men who are +cos-ata-lu in an endeavor to learn the secret which they believe +will give them unlimited power over all other denizens of +Caspak.</p> +<p>No Wieroos come up from the beginning—all are born of the +Wieroo fathers and Galu mothers who are cos-ata-lo, and there are +very few of the latter owing to the long and precarious stages of +development. Seven generations of the same ancestor must come up +from the beginning before a cos-ata-lu child may be born; and when +one considers the frightful dangers that surround the vital spark +from the moment it leaves the warm pool where it has been deposited +to float down to the sea amid the voracious creatures that swarm +the surface and the deeps and the almost equally unthinkable trials +of its effort to survive after it once becomes a land animal and +starts northward through the horrors of the Caspakian jungles and +forests, it is plainly a wonder that even a single babe has ever +been born to a Galu woman.</p> +<p>Seven cycles it requires before the seventh Galu can complete +the seventh danger-infested circle since its first Galu ancestor +achieved the state of Galu. For ages before, the ancestors of this +first Galu may have developed from a Band-lu or Bo-lu egg without +ever once completing the whole circle—that is from a Galu +egg, back to a fully developed Galu.</p> +<p>Bradley’s head was whirling before he even commenced to +grasp the complexities of Caspakian evolution; but as the truth +slowly filtered into his understanding—as gradually it became +possible for him to visualize the scheme, it appeared simpler. In +fact, it seemed even less difficult of comprehension than that with +which he was familiar.</p> +<p>For several minutes after An-Tak ceased speaking, his voice +having trailed off weakly into silence, neither spoke again. Then +the Galu recommenced his, “Food! Food! There is a way +out!” Bradley tossed him another bit of dried meat, waiting +patiently until he had eaten it, this time more slowly.</p> +<p>“What do you mean by saying there is a way out?” he +asked.</p> +<p>“He who died here just after I came, told me,” +replied An-Tak. “He said there was a way out, that he had +discovered it but was too weak to use his knowledge. He was trying +to tell me how to find it when he died. Oh, Luata, if he had lived +but a moment more!”</p> +<p>“They do not feed you here?” asked Bradley.</p> +<p>“No, they give me water once a day—that is +all.”</p> +<p>“But how have you lived, then?”</p> +<p>“The lizards and the rats,” replied An-Tak. +“The lizards are not so bad; but the rats are foul to taste. +However, I must eat them or they would eat me, and they are better +than nothing; but of late they do not come so often, and I have not +had a lizard for a long time. I shall eat though,” he +mumbled. “I shall eat now, for you cannot remain awake +forever.” He laughed, a cackling, dry laugh. “When you +sleep, An-Tak will eat.”</p> +<p>It was horrible. Bradley shuddered. For a long time each sat in +silence. The Englishman could guess why the other made no +sound—he awaited the moment that sleep should overcome his +victim. In the long silence there was born upon Bradley’s +ears a faint, monotonous sound as of running water. He listened +intently. It seemed to come from far beneath the floor.</p> +<p>“What is that noise?” he asked. “That sounds +like water running through a narrow channel.”</p> +<p>“It is the river,” replied An-Tak. “Why do you +not go to sleep? It passes directly beneath the Blue Place of Seven +Skulls. It runs through the temple grounds, beneath the temple and +under the city. When we die, they will cut off our heads and throw +our bodies into the river. At the mouth of the river await many +large reptiles. Thus do they feed. The Wieroos do likewise with +their own dead, keeping only the skulls and the wings. Come, let us +sleep.”</p> +<p>“Do the reptiles come up the river into the city?” +asked Bradley.</p> +<p>“The water is too cold—they never leave the warm +water of the great pool,” replied An-Tak.</p> +<p>“Let us search for the way out,” suggested +Bradley.</p> +<p>An-Tak shook his head. “I have searched for it all these +moons,” he said. “If I could not find it, how would +you?”</p> +<p>Bradley made no reply but commenced a diligent examination of +the walls and floor of the room, pressing over each square foot and +tapping with his knuckles. About six feet from the floor he +discovered a sleeping-perch near one end of the apartment. He asked +An-Tak about it, but the Galu said that no Weiroo had occupied the +place since he had been incarcerated there. Again and again Bradley +went over the floor and walls as high up as he could reach. Finally +he swung himself to the perch, that he might examine at least one +end of the room all the way to the ceiling.</p> +<p>In the center of the wall close to the top, an area about three +feet square gave forth a hollow sound when he rapped upon it. +Bradley felt over every square inch of that area with the tips of +his fingers. Near the top he found a small round hole a trifle +larger in diameter than his forefinger, which he immediately stuck +into it. The panel, if such it was, seemed about an inch thick, and +beyond it his finger encountered nothing. Bradley crooked his +finger upon the opposite side of the panel and pulled toward him, +steadily but with considerable force. Suddenly the panel flew +inward, nearly precipitating the man to the floor. It was hinged at +the bottom, and when lowered the outer edge rested upon the perch, +making a little platform parallel with the floor of the room.</p> +<p>Beyond the opening was an utterly dark void. The Englishman +leaned through it and reached his arm as far as possible into the +blackness but touched nothing. Then he fumbled in his haversack for +a match, a few of which remained to him. When he struck it, An-Tak +gave a cry of terror. Bradley held the light far into the opening +before him and in its flickering rays saw the top of a ladder +descending into a black abyss below. How far down it extended he +could not guess; but that he should soon know definitely he was +positive.</p> +<p>“You have found it! You have found the way out!” +screamed An-Tak. “Oh, Luata! And now I am too weak to go. +Take me with you! Take me with you!”</p> +<p>“Shut up!” admonished Bradley. “You will have +the whole flock of birds around our heads in a minute, and neither +of us will escape. Be quiet, and I’ll go ahead. If I find a +way out, I’ll come back and help you, if you’ll promise +not to try to eat me up again.”</p> +<p>“I promise,” cried An-Tak. “Oh, Luata! How +could you blame me? I am half crazed of hunger and long confinement +and the horror of the lizards and the rats and the constant waiting +for death.”</p> +<p>“I know,” said Bradley simply. “I’m +sorry for you, old top. Keep a stiff upper lip.” And he +slipped through the opening, found the ladder with his feet, closed +the panel behind him, and started downward into the darkness.</p> +<p>Below him rose more and more distinctly the sound of running +water. The air felt damp and cool. He could see nothing of his +surroundings and felt nothing but the smooth, worn sides and rungs +of the ladder down which he felt his way cautiously lest a broken +rung or a misstep should hurl him downward.</p> +<p>As he descended thus slowly, the ladder seemed interminable and +the pit bottomless, yet he realized when at last he reached the +bottom that he could not have descended more than fifty feet. The +bottom of the ladder rested on a narrow ledge paved with what felt +like large round stones, but what he knew from experience to be +human skulls. He could not but marvel as to where so many countless +thousands of the things had come from, until he paused to consider +that the infancy of Caspak dated doubtlessly back into remote ages, +far beyond what the outer world considered the beginning of earthly +time. For all these eons the Wieroos might have been collecting +human skulls from their enemies and their own dead—enough to +have built an entire city of them.</p> +<p>Feeling his way along the narrow ledge, Bradley came presently +to a blank wall that stretched out over the water swirling beneath +him, as far as he could reach. Stooping, he groped about with one +hand, reaching down toward the surface of the water, and discovered +that the bottom of the wall arched above the stream. How much space +there was between the water and the arch he could not tell, nor how +deep the former. There was only one way in which he might learn +these things, and that was to lower himself into the stream. For +only an instant he hesitated weighing his chances. Behind him lay +almost certainly the horrid fate of An-Tak; before him nothing +worse than a comparatively painless death by drowning. Holding his +haversack above his head with one hand he lowered his feet slowly +over the edge of the narrow platform. Almost immediately he felt +the swirling of cold water about his ankles, and then with a silent +prayer he let himself drop gently into the stream.</p> +<p>Great was Bradley’s relief when he found the water no more +than waist deep and beneath his feet a firm, gravel bottom. Feeling +his way cautiously he moved downward with the current, which was +not so strong as he had imagined from the noise of the running +water.</p> +<p>Beneath the first arch he made his way, following the winding +curvatures of the right-hand wall. After a few yards of progress +his hand came suddenly in contact with a slimy thing clinging to +the wall—a thing that hissed and scuttled out of reach. What +it was, the man could not know; but almost instantly there was a +splash in the water just ahead of him and then another.</p> +<p>On he went, passing beneath other arches at varying distances, +and always in utter darkness. Unseen denizens of this great sewer, +disturbed by the intruder, splashed into the water ahead of him and +wriggled away. Time and again his hand touched them and never for +an instant could he be sure that at the next step some gruesome +thing might not attack him. He had strapped his haversack about his +neck, well above the surface of the water, and in his left hand he +carried his knife. Other precautions there were none to take.</p> +<p>The monotony of the blind trail was increased by the fact that +from the moment he had started from the foot of the ladder he had +counted his every step. He had promised to return for An-Tak if it +proved humanly possible to do so, and he knew that in the blackness +of the tunnel he could locate the foot of the ladder in no other +way.</p> +<p>He had taken two hundred and sixty-nine steps—afterward he +knew that he should never forget that number—when something +bumped gently against him from behind. Instantly he wheeled about +and with knife ready to defend himself stretched forth his right +hand to push away the object that now had lodged against his body. +His fingers feeling through the darkness came in contact with +something cold and clammy—they passed to and fro over the +thing until Bradley knew that it was the face of a dead man +floating upon the surface of the stream. With an oath he pushed his +gruesome companion out into mid-stream to float on down toward the +great pool and the awaiting scavengers of the deep.</p> +<p>At his four hundred and thirteenth step another corpse bumped +against him—how many had passed him without touching he could +not guess; but suddenly he experienced the sensation of being +surrounded by dead faces floating along with him, all set in +hideous grimaces, their dead eyes glaring at this profaning alien +who dared intrude upon the waters of this river of the dead—a +horrid escort, pregnant with dire forebodings and with menace.</p> +<p>Though he advanced very slowly, he tried always to take steps of +about the same length; so that he knew that though considerable +time had elapsed, yet he had really advanced no more than four +hundred yards when ahead he saw a lessening of the pitch-darkness, +and at the next turn of the stream his surroundings became +vaguelydiscernible. Above him was an arched roof and on either hand +walls pierced at intervals by apertures covered with wooden doors. +Just ahead of him in the roof of the aqueduct was a round, black +hole about thirty inches in diameter. His eyes still rested upon +the opening when there shot downward from it to the water below the +naked body of a human being which almost immediately rose to the +surface again and floated off down the stream. In the dim light +Bradley saw that it was a dead Wieroo from which the wings and head +had been removed. A moment later another headless body floated +past, recalling what An-Tak had told him of the skull-collecting +customs of the Wieroo. Bradley wondered how it happened that the +first corpse he had encountered in the stream had not been +similarly mutilated.</p> +<p>The farther he advanced now, the lighter it became. The number +of corpses was much smaller than he had imagined, only two more +passing him before, at six hundred steps, or about five hundred +yards, from the point he had taken to the stream, he came to the +end of the tunnel and looked out upon sunlit water, running between +grassy banks.</p> +<p>One of the last corpses to pass him was still clothed in the +white robe of a Wieroo, blood-stained over the headless neck that +it concealed.</p> +<p>Drawing closer to the opening leading into the bright daylight, +Bradley surveyed what lay beyond. A short distance before him a +large building stood in the center of several acres of grass and +tree-covered ground, spanning the stream which disappeared through +an opening in its foundation wall. From the large saucer-shaped +roof and the vivid colorings of the various heterogeneous parts of +the structure he recognized it as the temple past which he had been +borne to the Blue Place of Seven Skulls.</p> +<p>To and fro flew Wieroos, going to and from the temple. Others +passed on foot across the open grounds, assisting themselves with +their great wings, so that they barely skimmed the earth. To leave +the mouth of the tunnel would have been to court instant discovery +and capture; but by what other avenue he might escape, Bradley +could not guess, unless he retraced his steps up the stream and +sought egress from the other end of the city. The thought of +traversing that dark and horror-ridden tunnel for perhaps miles he +could not entertain—there must be some other way. Perhaps +after dark he could steal through the temple grounds and continue +on downstream until he had come beyond the city; and so he stood +and waited until his limbs became almost paralyzed with cold, and +he knew that he must find some other plan for escape.</p> +<p>A half-formed decision to risk an attempt to swim under water to +the temple was crystallizing in spite of the fact that any chance +Wieroo flying above the stream might easily see him, when again a +floating object bumped against him from behind and lodged across +his back. Turning quickly he saw that the thing was what he had +immediately guessed it to be—a headless and wingless Wieroo +corpse. With a grunt of disgust he was about to push it from him +when the white garment enshrouding it suggested a bold plan to his +resourceful brain. Grasping the corpse by an arm he tore the +garment from it and then let the body float downward toward the +temple. With great care he draped the robe about him; the bloody +blotch that had covered the severed neck he arranged about his own +head. His haversack he rolled as tightly as possible and stuffed +beneath his coat over his breast. Then he fell gently to the +surface of the stream and lying upon his back floated downward with +the current and out into the open sunlight.</p> +<p>Through the weave of the cloth he could distinguish large +objects. He saw a Wieroo flap dismally above him; he saw the banks +of the stream float slowly past; he heard a sudden wail upon the +right- hand shore, and his heart stood still lest his ruse had been +discovered; but never by a move of a muscle did he betray that +aught but a cold lump of clay floated there upon the bosom of the +water, and soon, though it seemed an eternity to him, the direct +sunlight was blotted out, and he knew that he had entered beneath +the temple.</p> +<p>Quickly he felt for bottom with his feet and as quickly stood +erect, snatching the bloody, clammy cloth from his face. On both +sides were blank walls and before him the river turned a sharp +corner and disappeared. Feeling his way cautiously forward he +approached the turn and looked around the corner. To his left was a +low platform about a foot above the level of the stream, and onto +this he lost no time in climbing, for he was soaked from head to +foot, cold and almost exhausted.</p> +<p>As he lay resting on the skull-paved shelf, he saw in the center +of the vault above the river another of those sinister round holes +through which he momentarily expected to see a headless corpse +shoot downward in its last plunge to a watery grave. A few feet +along the platform a closed door broke the blankness of the wall. +As he lay looking at it and wondering what lay behind, his mind +filled with fragments of many wild schemes of escape, it opened and +a white robed Wieroo stepped out upon the platform. The creature +carried a large wooden basin filled with rubbish. Its eyes were not +upon Bradley, who drew himself to a squatting position and crouched +as far back in the corner of the niche in which the platform was +set as he could force himself. The Wieroo stepped to the edge of +the platform and dumped the rubbish into the stream. If it turned +away from him as it started to retrace its steps to the doorway, +there was a small chance that it might not see him; but if it +turned toward him there was none at all. Bradley held his +breath.</p> +<p>The Wieroo paused a moment, gazing down into the water, then it +straightened up and turned toward the Englishman. Bradley did not +move. The Wieroo stopped and stared intently at him. It approached +him questioningly. Still Bradley remained as though carved of +stone. The creature was directly in front of him. It stopped. There +was no chance on earth that it would not discover what he was.</p> +<p>With the quickness of a cat, Bradley sprang to his feet and with +all his great strength, backed by his heavy weight, struck the +Wieroo upon the point of the chin. Without a sound the thing +crumpled to the platform, while Bradley, acting almost +instinctively to the urge of the first law of nature, rolled the +inanimate body over the edge into the river.</p> +<p>Then he looked at the open doorway, crossed the platform and +peered within the apartment beyond. What he saw was a large room, +dimly lighted, and about the side rows of wooden vessels stacked +one upon another. There was no Wieroo in sight, so the Englishman +entered. At the far end of the room was another door, and as he +crossed toward it, he glanced into some of the vessels, which he +found were filled with dried fruits, vegetables and fish. Without +more ado he stuffed his pockets and his haversack full, thinking of +the poor creature awaiting his return in the gloom of the Place of +Seven Skulls.</p> +<p>When night came, he would return and fetch An-Tak this far at +least; but in the meantime it was his intention to reconnoiter in +the hope that he might discover some easier way out of the city +than that offered by the chill, black channel of the ghastly river +of corpses.</p> +<p>Beyond the farther door stretched a long passageway from which +closed doorways led into other parts of the cellars of the temple. +A few yards from the storeroom a ladder rose from the corridor +through an aperture in the ceiling. Bradley paused at the foot of +it, debating the wisdom of further investigation against a return +to the river; but strong within him was the spirit of exploration +that has scattered his race to the four corners of the earth. What +new mysteries lay hidden in the chambers above? The urge to know +was strong upon him though his better judgment warned him that the +safer course lay in retreat. For a moment he stood thus, running +his fingers through his hair; then he cast discretion to the winds +and began the ascent.</p> +<p>In conformity with such Wieroo architecture as he had already +observed, the well through which the ladder rose continually canted +at an angle from the perpendicular. At more or less regular stages +it was pierced by apertures closed by doors, none of which he could +open until he had climbed fully fifty feet from the river level. +Here he discovered a door already ajar opening into a large, +circular chamber, the walls and floors of which were covered with +the skins of wild beasts and with rugs of many colors; but what +interested him most was the occupants of the room—a Wieroo, +and a girl of human proportions. She was standing with her back +against a column which rose from the center of the apartment from +floor to ceiling—a hollow column about forty inches in +diameter in which he could see an opening some thirty inches +across. The girl’s side was toward Bradley, and her face +averted, for she was watching the Wieroo, who was now advancing +slowly toward her, talking as he came.</p> +<p>Bradley could distinctly hear the words of the creature, who was +urging the girl to accompany him to another Wieroo city. +“Come with me,” he said, “and you shall have your +life; remain here and He Who Speaks for Luata will claim you for +his own; and when he is done with you, your skull will bleach at +the top of a tall staff while your body feeds the reptiles at the +mouth of the River of Death. Even though you bring into the world a +female Wieroo, your fate will be the same if you do not escape him, +while with me you shall have life and food and none shall harm +you.”</p> +<p>He was quite close to the girl when she replied by striking him +in the face with all her strength. “Until I am slain,” +she cried, “I shall fight against you all.” From the +throat of the Wieroo issued that dismal wail that Bradley had heard +so often in the past—it was like a scream of pain smothered +to a groan—and then the thing leaped upon the girl, its face +working in hideous grimaces as it clawed and beat at her to force +her to the floor.</p> +<p>The Englishman was upon the point of entering to defend her when +a door at the opposite side of the chamber opened to admit a huge +Wieroo clothed entirely in red. At sight of the two struggling upon +the floor the newcomer raised his voice in a shriek of rage. +Instantly the Wieroo who was attacking the girl leaped to his feet +and faced the other.</p> +<p>“I heard,” screamed he who had just entered the +room. “I heard, and when He Who Speaks for Lu-ata shall have +heard—” He paused and made a suggestive movement of a +finger across his throat.</p> +<p>“He shall not hear,” returned the first Wieroo as, +with a powerful motion of his great wings, he launched himself upon +the red-robed figure. The latter dodged the first charge, drew a +wicked-looking curved blade from beneath its red robe, spread its +wings and dived for its antagonist. Beating their wings, wailing +and groaning, the two hideous things sparred for position. The +white-robed one being unarmed sought to grasp the other by the +wrist of its knife-hand and by the throat, while the latter hopped +around on its dainty white feet, seeking an opening for a mortal +blow. Once it struck and missed, and then the other rushed in and +clinched, at the same time securing both the holds it sought. +Immediately the two commenced beating at each other’s heads +with the joints of their wings, kicking with their soft, puny feet +and biting, each at the other’s face.</p> +<p>In the meantime the girl moved about the room, keeping out of +the way of the duelists, and as she did so, Bradley caught a +glimpse of her full face and immediately recognized her as the girl +of the place of the yellow door. He did not dare intervene now +until one of the Wieroo had overcome the other, lest the two should +turn upon him at once, when the chances were fair that he would be +defeated in so unequal a battle as the curved blade of the red +Wieroo would render it, and so he waited, watching the white-robed +figure slowly choking the life from him of the red robe. The +protruding tongue and the popping eyes proclaimed that the end was +near and a moment later the red robe sank to the floor of the room, +the curved blade slipping from nerveless fingers. For an instant +longer the victor clung to the throat of his defeated antagonist +and then he rose, dragging the body after him, and approached the +central column. Here he raised the body and thrust it into the +aperture where Bradley saw it drop suddenly from sight. Instantly +there flashed into his memory the circular openings in the roof of +the river vault and the corpses he had seen drop from them to the +water beneath.</p> +<p>As the body disappeared, the Wieroo turned and cast about the +room for the girl. For a moment he stood eying her. “You +saw,” he muttered, “and if you tell them, He Who Speaks +for Luata will have my wings severed while still I live and my head +will be severed and I shall be cast into the River of Death, for +thus it happens even to the highest who slay one of the red robe. +You saw, and you must die!” he ended with a scream as he +rushed upon the girl.</p> +<p>Bradley waited no longer. Leaping into the room he ran for the +Wieroo, who had already seized the girl, and as he ran, he stooped +and picked up the curved blade. The creature’s back was +toward him as, with his left hand, he seized it by the neck. Like a +flash the great wings beat backward as the creature turned, and +Bradley was swept from his feet, though he still retained his hold +upon the blade. Instantly the Wieroo was upon him. Bradley lay +slightly raised upon his left elbow, his right arm free, and as the +thing came close, he cut at the hideous face with all the strength +that lay within him. The blade struck at the junction of the neck +and torso and with such force as to completely decapitate the +Wieroo, the hideous head dropping to the floor and the body falling +forward upon the Englishman. Pushing it from him he rose to his +feet and faced the wide-eyed girl.</p> +<p>“Luata!” she exclaimed. “How came you +here?”</p> +<p>Bradley shrugged. “Here I am,” he said; “but +the thing now is to get out of here—both of us.”</p> +<p>The girl shook her head. “It cannot be,” she stated +sadly.</p> +<p>“That is what I thought when they dropped me into the Blue +Place of Seven Skulls,” replied Bradley. “Can’t +be done. I did it.— Here! You’re mussing up the floor +something awful, you.” This last to the dead Wieroo as he +stooped and dragged the corpse to the central shaft, where he +raised it to the aperture and let it slip into the tube. Then he +picked up the head and tossed it after the body. “Don’t +be so glum,” he admonished the former as he carried it toward +the well; “smile!”</p> +<p>“But how can he smile?” questioned the girl, a +half-puzzled, half-frightened look upon her face. “He is +dead.”</p> +<p>“That’s so,” admitted Bradley, “and I +suppose he does feel a bit cut up about it.”</p> +<p>The girl shook her head and edged away from the man—toward +the door.</p> +<p>“Come!” said the Englishman. “We’ve got +to get out of here. If you don’t know a better way than the +river, it’s the river then.”</p> +<p>The girl still eyed him askance. “But how could he smile +when he was dead?”</p> +<p>Bradley laughed aloud. “I thought we English were supposed +to have the least sense of humor of any people in the world,” +he cried; “but now I’ve found one human being who +hasn’t any. Of course you don’t know half I’m +saying; but don’t worry, little girl; I’m not going to +hurt you, and if I can get you out of here, I’ll do +it.”</p> +<p>Even if she did not understand all he said, she at least read +something in his smiling, countenance—something which +reassured her. “I do not fear you,” she said; +“though I do not understand all that you say even though you +speak my own tongue and use words that I know. But as for +escaping”—she sighed—“alas, how can it be +done?”</p> +<p>“I escaped from the Blue Place of Seven Skulls,” +Bradley reminded her. “Come!” And he turned toward the +shaft and the ladder that he had ascended from the river. “We +cannot waste time here.”</p> +<p>The girl followed him; but at the doorway both drew back, for +from below came the sound of some one ascending.</p> +<p>Bradley tiptoed to the door and peered cautiously into the well; +then he stepped back beside the girl. “There are half a dozen +of them coming up; but possibly they will pass this +room.”</p> +<p>“No,” she said, “they will pass directly +through this room—they are on their way to Him Who Speaks for +Luata. We may be able to hide in the next room—there are +skins there beneath which we may crawl. They will not stop in that +room; but they may stop in this one for a short time—the +other room is blue.”</p> +<p>“What’s that go to do with it?” demanded the +Englishman.</p> +<p>“They fear blue,” she replied. “In every room +where murder has been done you will find blue—a certain +amount for each murder. When the room is all blue, they shun it. +This room has much blue; but evidently they kill mostly in the next +room, which is now all blue.”</p> +<p>“But there is blue on the outside of every house I have +seen,” said Bradley.</p> +<p>“Yes, ” assented the girl, “and there are blue +rooms in each of those houses—when all the rooms are blue +then the whole outside of the house will be blue as is the Blue +Place of Seven Skulls. There are many such here.”</p> +<p>“And the skulls with blue upon them?” inquired +Bradley. “Did they belong to murderers?”</p> +<p>“They were murdered—some of them; those with only a +small amount of blue were murderers—known murderers. All +Wieroos are murderers. When they have committed a certain number of +murders without being caught at it, they confess to Him Who Speaks +for Luata and are advanced, after which they wear robes with a +slash of some color— I think yellow comes first. When they +reach a point where the entire robe is of yellow, they discard it +for a white robe with a red slash; and when one wins a complete red +robe, he carries such a long, curved knife as you have in your +hand; after that comes the blue slash on a white robe, and then, I +suppose, an all blue robe. I have never seen such a one.”</p> +<p>As they talked in low tones they had moved from the room of the +death shaft into an all blue room adjoining, where they sat down +together in a corner with their backs against a wall and drew a +pile of hides over themselves. A moment later they heard a number +of Wieroos enter the chamber. They were talking together as they +crossed the floor, or the two could not have heard them. Halfway +across the chamber they halted as the door toward which they were +advancing opened and a dozen others of their kind entered the +apartment.</p> +<p>Bradley could guess all this by the increased volume of sound +and the dismal greetings; but the sudden silence that almost +immediately ensued he could not fathom, for he could not know that +from beneath one of the hides that covered him protruded one of his +heavy army shoes, or that some eighteen large Wieroos with robes +either solid red or slashed with red or blue were standing gazing +at it. Nor could he hear their stealthy approach.</p> +<p>The first intimation he had that he had been discovered was when +his foot was suddenly seized, and he was yanked violently from +beneath the hides to find himself surrounded by menacing blades. +They would have slain him on the spot had not one clothed all in +red held them back, saying that He Who Speaks for Luata desired to +see this strange creature.</p> +<p>As they led Bradley away, he caught an opportunity to glance +back toward the hides to see what had become of the girl, and, to +his gratification, he discovered that she still lay concealed +beneath the hides. He wondered if she would have the nerve to +attempt the river trip alone and regretted that now he could not +accompany her. He felt rather all in, himself, more so than he had +at any time since he had been captured by the Wieroo, for there +appeared not the slightest cause for hope in his present +predicament. He had dropped the curved blade beneath the hides when +he had been jerked so violently from their fancied security. It was +almost in a spirit of resigned hopelessness that he quietly +accompanied his captors through various chambers and corridors +toward the heart of the temple.</p> +<h3><a id="Ch_4" name="Ch_4"></a>Chapter 4</h3> +<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of +Contents</a></p> +<p>The farther the group progressed, the more barbaric and the more +sumptuous became the decorations. Hides of leopard and tiger +predominated, apparently because of their more beautiful markings, +and decorative skulls became more and more numerous. Many of the +latter were mounted in precious metals and set with colored stones +and priceless gems, while thick upon the hides that covered the +walls were golden ornaments similar to those worn by the girl and +those which had filled the chests he had examined in the storeroom +of Fosh-bal-soj, leading the Englishman to the conviction that all +such were spoils of war or theft, since each piece seemed made for +personal adornment, while in so far as he had seen, no Wieroo wore +ornaments of any sort.</p> +<p>And also as they advanced the more numerous became the Wieroos +moving hither and thither within the temple. Many now were the +solid red robes and those that were slashed with blue—a +veritable hive of murderers.</p> +<p>At last the party halted in a room in which were many Wieroos +who gathered about Bradley questioning his captors and examining +him and his apparel. One of the party accompanying the Englishman +spoke to a Wieroo that stood beside a door leading from the room. +“Tell Him Who Speaks for Luata,” he said, “that +Fosh-bal-soj we could not find; but that in returning we found this +creature within the temple, hiding. It must be the same that +Fosh-bal-soj captured in the Sto-lu country during the last +darkness. Doubtless He Who Speaks for Luata would wish to see and +question this strange thing.”</p> +<p>The creature addressed turned and slipped through the doorway, +closing the door after it, but first depositing its curved blade +upon the floor without. Its post was immediately taken by another +and Bradley now saw that at least twenty such guards loitered in +the immediate vicinity. The doorkeeper was gone but for a moment, +and when he returned, he signified that Bradley’s party was +to enter the next chamber; but first each of the Wieroos removed +his curved weapon and laid it upon the floor. The door was swung +open, and the party, now reduced to Bradley and five Wieroos, was +ushered across the threshold into a large, irregularly shaped room +in which a single, giant Wieroo whose robe was solid blue sat upon +a raised dais.</p> +<p>The creature’s face was white with the whiteness of a +corpse, its dead eyes entirely expressionless, its cruel, thin lips +tight-drawn against yellow teeth in a perpetual grimace. Upon +either side of it lay an enormous, curved sword, similar to those +with which some of the other Wieroos had been armed, but larger and +heavier. Constantly its clawlike fingers played with one or the +other of these weapons.</p> +<p>The walls of the chamber as well as the floor were entirely +hidden by skins and woven fabrics. Blue predominated in all the +colorations. Fastened against the hides were many pairs of Wieroo +wings, mounted so that they resembled long, black shields. Upon the +ceiling were painted in blue characters a bewildering series of +hieroglyphics and upon pedestals set against the walls or standing +out well within the room were many human skulls.</p> +<p>As the Wieroos approached the figure upon the dais, they leaned +far forward, raising their wings above their heads and stretching +their necks as though offering them to the sharp swords of the grim +and hideous creature.</p> +<p>“O Thou Who Speakest for Luata!” exclaimed one of +the party. “We bring you the strange creature that +Fosh-bal-soj captured and brought thither at thy +command.”</p> +<p>So this then was the godlike figure that spoke for divinity! +This arch-murderer was the Caspakian representative of God on +Earth! His blue robe announced him the one and the seeming humility +of his minions the other. For a long minute he glared at Bradley. +Then he began to question him—from whence he came and how, +the name and description of his native country, and a hundred other +queries.</p> +<p>“Are you cos-ata-lu?” the creature asked.</p> +<p>Bradley replied that he was and that all his kind were, as well +as every living thing in his part of the world.</p> +<p>“Can you tell me the secret?” asked the +creature.</p> +<p>Bradley hesitated and then, thinking to gain time, replied in +the affirmative.</p> +<p>“What is it?” demanded the Wieroo, leaning far +forward and exhibiting every evidence of excited interest.</p> +<p>Bradley leaned forward and whispered: “It is for your ears +alone; I will not divulge it to others, and then only on condition +that you carry me and the girl I saw in the place of the yellow +door near to that of Fosh-bal-soj back to her own +country.”</p> +<p>The thing rose in wrath, holding one of its swords above its +head.</p> +<p>“Who are you to make terms for Him Who Speaks for +Luata?” it shrilled. “Tell me the secret or die where +you stand!”</p> +<p>“And if I die now, the secret goes with me,” Bradley +reminded him. “Never again will you get the opportunity to +question another of my kind who knows the secret.” Anything +to gain time, to get the rest of the Wieroos from the room, that he +might plan some scheme for escape and put it into effect.</p> +<p>The creature turned upon the leader of the party that had +brought Bradley.</p> +<p>“Is the thing with weapons?” it asked.</p> +<p>“No,” was the response.</p> +<p>“Then go; but tell the guard to remain close by,” +commanded the high one.</p> +<p>The Wieroos salaamed and withdrew, closing the door behind them. +He Who Speaks for Luata grasped a sword nervously in his right +hand. At his left side lay the second weapon. It was evident that +he lived in constant dread of being assassinated. The fact that he +permitted none with weapons within his presence and that he always +kept two swords at his side pointed to this.</p> +<p>Bradley was racking his brain to find some suggestion of a plan +whereby he might turn the situation to his own account. His eyes +wandered past the weird figure before him; they played about the +walls of the apartment as though hoping to draw inspiration from +the dead skulls and the hides and the wings, and then they came +back to the face of the Wieroo god, now working in anger.</p> +<p>“Quick!” screamed the thing. “The +secret!”</p> +<p>“Will you give me and the girl our freedom?” +insisted Bradley.</p> +<p>For an instant the thing hesitated, and then it grumbled +“Yes.” At the same instant Bradley saw two hides upon +the wall directly back of the dais separate and a face appear in +the opening. No change of expression upon the Englishman’s +countenance betrayed that he had seen aught to surprise him, though +surprised he was for the face in the aperture was that of the girl +he had but just left hidden beneath the hides in another chamber. A +white and shapely arm now pushed past the face into the room, and +in the hand, tightly clutched, was the curved blade, smeared with +blood, that Bradley had dropped beneath the hides at the moment he +had been discovered and drawn from his concealment.</p> +<p>“Listen, then,” said Bradley in a low voice to the +Wieroo. “You shall know the secret of cos-ata-lu as well as +do I; but none other may hear it. Lean close—I will whisper +it into your ear.”</p> +<p>He moved forward and stepped upon the dais. The creature raised +its sword ready to strike at the first indication of treachery, and +Bradley stooped beneath the blade and put his ear close to the +gruesome face. As he did so, he rested his weight upon his hands, +one upon either side of the Wieroo’s body, his right hand +upon the hilt of the spare sword lying at the left of Him Who +Speaks for Luata.</p> +<p>“This then is the secret of both life and death,” he +whispered, and at the same instant he grasped the Wieroo by the +right wrist and with his own right hand swung the extra blade in a +sudden vicious blow against the creature’s neck before the +thing could give even a single cry of alarm; then without waiting +an instant Bradley leaped past the dead god and vanished behind the +hides that had hidden the girl.</p> +<p>Wide-eyed and panting the girl seized his arm. “Oh, what +have you done?” she cried. “He Who Speaks for Luata +will be avenged by Luata. Now indeed must you die. There is no +escape, for even though we reached my own country Luata can find +you out.”</p> +<p>“Bosh!” exclaimed Bradley, and then: “But you +were going to knife him yourself.”</p> +<p>“Then I alone should have died,” she replied.</p> +<p>Bradley scratched his head. “Neither of us is going to +die,” he said; “at least not at the hands of any god. +If we don’t get out of here though, we’ll die right +enough. Can you find your way back to the room where I first came +upon you in the temple?”</p> +<p>“I know the way,” replied the girl; “but I +doubt if we can go back without being seen. I came hither because I +only met Wieroos who knew that I am supposed now to be in the +temple; but you could go elsewhere without being +discovered.”</p> +<p>Bradley’s ingenuity had come up against a stone wall. +There seemed no possibility of escape. He looked about him. They +were in a small room where lay a litter of rubbish—torn bits +of cloth, old hides, pieces of fiber rope. In the center of the +room was a cylindrical shaft with an opening in its face. Bradley +knew it for what it was. Here the arch-fiend dragged his victims +and cast their bodies into the river of death far below. The floor +about the opening in the shaft and the sides of the shaft were +clotted thick with a dried, dark brown substance that the +Englishman knew had once been blood. The place had the appearance +of having been a veritable shambles. An odor of decaying flesh +permeated the air.</p> +<p>The Englishman crossed to the shaft and peered into the opening. +All below was dark as pitch; but at the bottom he knew was the +river. Suddenly an inspiration and a bold scheme leaped to his +mind. Turning quickly he hunted about the room until he found what +he sought—a quantity of the rope that lay strewn here and +there. With rapid fingers he unsnarled the different lengths, the +girl helping him, and then he tied the ends together until he had +three ropes about seventy-five feet in length. He fastened these +together at each end and without a word secured one of the ends +about the girl’s body beneath her arms.</p> +<p>“Don’t be frightened,” he said at length, as +he led her toward the opening in the shaft. “I’m going +to lower you to the river, and then I’m coming down after +you. When you are safe below, give two quick jerks upon the rope. +If there is danger there and you want me to draw you up into the +shaft, jerk once. Don’t be afraid—it is the only +way.”</p> +<p>“I am not afraid,” replied the girl, rather +haughtily Bradley thought, and herself climbed through the aperture +and hung by her hands waiting for Bradley to lower her.</p> +<p>As rapidly as was consistent with safety, the man paid out the +rope. When it was about half out, he heard loud cries and wails +suddenly arise within the room they had just quitted. The slaying +of their god had been discovered by the Wieroos. A search for the +slayer would begin at once.</p> +<p>Lord! Would the girl never reach the river? At last, just as he +was positive that searchers were already entering the room behind +him, there came two quick tugs at the rope. Instantly Bradley made +the rest of the strands fast about the shaft, slipped into the +black tube and began a hurried descent toward the river. An instant +later he stood waist deep in water beside the girl. Impulsively she +reached toward him and grasped his arm. A strange thrill ran +through him at the contact; but he only cut the rope from about her +body and lifted her to the little shelf at the river’s +side.</p> +<p>“How can we leave here?” she asked.</p> +<p>“By the river,” he replied; “but first I must +go back to the Blue Place of Seven Skulls and get the poor devil I +left there. I’ll have to wait until after dark, though, as I +cannot pass through the open stretch of river in the temple gardens +by day.”</p> +<p>“There is another way,” said the girl. “I have +never seen it; but often I have heard them speak of it—a +corridor that runs beside the river from one end of the city to the +other. Through the gardens it is below ground. If we could find an +entrance to it, we could leave here at once. It is not safe here, +for they will search every inch of the temple and the +grounds.”</p> +<p>“Come,” said Bradley. “We’ll have a look +for it, anyway.” And so saying he approached one of the doors +that opened onto the skull-paved shelf.</p> +<p>They found the corridor easily, for it paralleled the river, +separated from it only by a single wall. It took them beneath the +gardens and the city, always through inky darkness. After they had +reached the other side of the gardens, Bradley counted his steps +until he had retraced as many as he had taken coming down the +stream; but though they had to grope their way along, it was a much +more rapid trip than the former.</p> +<p>When he thought he was about opposite the point at which he had +descended from the Blue Place of Seven Skulls, he sought and found +a doorway leading out onto the river; and then, still in the +blackest darkness, he lowered himself into the stream and felt up +and down upon the opposite side for the little shelf and the +ladder. Ten yards from where he had emerged he found them, while +the girl waited upon the opposite side.</p> +<p>To ascend to the secret panel was the work of but a minute. Here +he paused and listened lest a Wieroo might be visiting the prison +in search of him or the other inmate; but no sound came from the +gloomy interior. Bradley could not but muse upon the joy of the man +on the opposite side when he should drop down to him with food and +a new hope for escape. Then he opened the panel and looked into the +room. The faint light from the grating above revealed the pile of +rags in one corner; but the man lay beneath them, he made no +response to Bradley’s low greeting.</p> +<p>The Englishman lowered himself to the floor of the room and +approached the rags. Stooping he lifted a corner of them. Yes, +there was the man asleep. Bradley shook him—there was no +response. He stooped lower and in the dim light examined An-Tak; +then he stood up with a sigh. A rat leaped from beneath the +coverings and scurried away. “Poor devil!” muttered +Bradley.</p> +<p>He crossed the room to swing himself to the perch preparatory to +quitting the Blue Place of Seven Skulls forever. Beneath the perch +he paused. “I’ll not give them the satisfaction,” +he growled. “Let them believe that he escaped.”</p> +<p>Returning to the pile of rags he gathered the man into his arms. +It was difficult work raising him to the high perch and dragging +him through the small opening and thus down the ladder; but +presently it was done, and Bradley had lowered the body into the +river and cast it off. “Good-bye, old top!” he +whispered.</p> +<p>A moment later he had rejoined the girl and hand in hand they +were following the dark corridor upstream toward the farther end of +the city. She told him that the Wieroos seldom frequented these +lower passages, as the air here was too chill for them; but +occasionally they came, and as they could see quite as well by +night as by day, they would be sure to discover Bradley and the +girl.</p> +<p>“If they come close enough,” she said, “we can +see their eyes shining in the dark—they resemble dull +splotches of light. They glow, but do not blaze like the eyes of +the tiger or the lion.”</p> +<p>The man could not but note the very evident horror with which +she mentioned the creatures. To him they were uncanny; but she had +been used to them for a year almost, and probably all her life she +had either seen or heard of them constantly.</p> +<p>“Why do you fear them so?” he asked. “It seems +more than any ordinary fear of the harm they can do you.”</p> +<p>She tried to explain; but the nearest he could gather was that +she looked upon the Wieroo almost as supernatural beings. +“There is a legend current among my people that once the +Wieroo were unlike us only in that they possessed rudimentary +wings. They lived in villages in the Galu country, and while the +two peoples often warred, they held no hatred for one another. In +those days each race came up from the beginning and there was great +rivalry as to which was the higher in the scale of evolution. The +Wieroo developed the first cos-ata-lu but they were always +male— never could they reproduce woman. Slowly they commenced +to develop certain attributes of the mind which, they considered, +placed them upon a still higher level and which gave them many +advantages over us, seeing which they thought only of mental +development—their minds became like stars and the rivers, +moving always in the same manner, never varying. They called this +tas-ad, which means doing everything the right way, or, in other +words, the Wieroo way. If foe or friend, right or wrong, stood in +the way of tas-ad, then it must be crushed.</p> +<p>“Soon the Galus and the lesser races of men came to hate +and fear them. It was then that the Wieroos decided to carry tas-ad +into every part of the world. They were very warlike and very +numerous, although they had long since adopted the policy of +slaying all those among them whose wings did not show advanced +development.</p> +<p>“It took ages for all this to happen—very slowly +came the different changes; but at last the Wieroos had wings they +could use. But by reason of always making war upon their neighbors +they were hated by every creature of Caspak, for no one wanted +their tas-ad, and so they used their wings to fly to this island +when the other races turned against them and threatened to kill +them all. So cruel had they become and so bloodthirsty that they no +longer had hearts that beat with love or sympathy; but their very +cruelty and wickedness kept them from conquering the other races, +since they were also cruel and wicked to one another, so that no +Wieroo trusted another.</p> +<p>“Always were they slaying those above them that they might +rise in power and possessions, until at last came the more powerful +than the others with a tas-ad all his own. He gathered about him a +few of the most terrible Wieroos, and among them they made laws +which took from all but these few Wieroos every weapon they +possessed.</p> +<p>“Now their tas-ad has reached a high plane among them. +They make many wonderful things that we cannot make. They think +great thoughts, no doubt, and still dream of greatness to come, but +their thoughts and their acts are regulated by ages of +custom—they are all alike—and they are most +unhappy.”</p> +<p>As the girl talked, the two moved steadily along the dark +passageway beside the river. They had advanced a considerable +distance when there sounded faintly from far ahead the muffled roar +of falling water, which increased in volume as they moved forward +until at last it filled the corridor with a deafening sound. Then +the corridor ended in a blank wall; but in a niche to the right was +a ladder leading aloft, and to the left was a door opening onto the +river. Bradley tried the latter first and as he opened it, felt a +heavy spray against his face. The little shelf outside the doorway +was wet and slippery, the roaring of the water tremendous. There +could be but one explanation—they had reached a waterfall in +the river, and if the corridor actually terminated here, their +escape was effectually cut off, since it was quite evidently +impossible to follow the bed of the river and ascend the falls.</p> +<p>As the ladder was the only alternative, the two turned toward it +and, the man first, began the ascent, which was through a well +similar to that which had led him to the upper floors of the +temple. As he climbed, Bradley felt for openings in the sides of +the shaft; but he discovered none below fifty feet. The first he +came to was ajar, letting a faint light into the well. As he +paused, the girl climbed to his side, and together they looked +through the crack into a low-ceiled chamber in which were several +Galu women and an equal number of hideous little replicas of the +full-grown Wieroos with which Bradley was not quite familiar.</p> +<p>He could feel the body of the girl pressed close to his tremble +as her eyes rested upon the inmates of the room, and involuntarily +his arm encircled her shoulders as though to protect her from some +danger which he sensed without recognizing.</p> +<p>“Poor things,” she whispered. “This is their +horrible fate—to be imprisoned here beneath the surface of +the city with their hideous offspring whom they hate as they hate +their fathers. A Wieroo keeps his children thus hidden until they +are full-grown lest they be murdered by their fellows. The lower +rooms of the city are filled with many such as these.”</p> +<p>Several feet above was a second door beyond which they found a +small room stored with food in wooden vessels. A grated window in +one wall opened above an alley, and through it they could see that +they were just below the roof of the building. Darkness was coming, +and at Bradley’s suggestion they decided to remain hidden +here until after dark and then to ascend to the roof and +reconnoiter.</p> +<p>Shortly after they had settled themselves they heard something +descending the ladder from above. They hoped that it would continue +on down the well and fairly held their breath as the sound +approached the door to the storeroom. Their hearts sank as they +heard the door open and from between cracks in the vessels behind +which they hid saw a yellow-slashed Wieroo enter the room. Each +recognized him immediately, the girl indicating the fact of her own +recognition by a sudden pressure of her fingers on Bradley’s +arm. It was the Wieroo of the yellow slashing whose abode was the +place of the yellow door in which Bradley had first seen the +girl.</p> +<p>The creature carried a wooden bowl which it filled with dried +food from several of the vessels; then it turned and quit the room. +Bradley could see through the partially open doorway that it +descended the ladder. The girl told him that it was taking the food +to the women and the young below, and that while it might return +immediately, the chances were that it would remain for some +time.</p> +<p>“We are just below the place of the yellow door,” +she said. “It is far from the edge of the city; so far that +we may not hope to escape if we ascend to the roofs +here.”</p> +<p>“I think,” replied the man, “that of all the +places in Oo-oh this will be the easiest to escape from. Anyway, I +want to return to the place of the yellow door and get my pistol if +it is there.”</p> +<p>“It is still there,” replied, the girl. “I saw +it placed in a chest where he keeps the things he takes from his +prisoners and victims.”</p> +<p>“Good!” exclaimed Bradley. “Now come, quickly. +“And the two crossed the room to the well and ascended the +ladder a short distance to its top where they found another door +that opened into a vacant room—the same in which Bradley had +first met the girl. To find the pistol was a matter of but a +moment’s search on the part of Bradley’s companion; and +then, at the Englishman’s signal, she followed him to the +yellow door.</p> +<p>It was quite dark without as the two entered the narrow passage +between two buildings. A few steps brought them undiscovered to the +doorway of the storeroom where lay the body of Fosh-bal-soj. In the +distance, toward the temple, they could hear sounds as of a great +gathering of Wieroos—the peculiar, uncanny wailing rising +above the dismal flapping of countless wings.</p> +<p>“They have heard of the killing of Him Who Speaks for +Luata,” whispered the girl. “Soon they will spread in +all directions searching for us.”</p> +<p>“And will they find us?”</p> +<p>“As surely as Lua gives light by day,” she replied; +“and when they find us, they will tear us to pieces, for only +the Wieroos may murder—only they may practice +tas-ad.”</p> +<p>“But they will not kill you,” said Bradley. +“You did not slay him.”</p> +<p>“It will make no difference,” she insisted. +“If they find us together they will slay us both.”</p> +<p>“Then they won’t find us together,” announced +Bradley decisively. “You stay right here—you +won’t be any worse off than before I came—and +I’ll get as far as I can and account for as many of the +beggars as possible before they get me. Good-bye! You’re a +mighty decent little girl. I wish that I might have helped +you.”</p> +<p>“No,” she cried. “Do not leave me. I would +rather die. I had hoped and hoped to find some way to return to my +own country. I wanted to go back to An-Tak, who must be very lonely +without me; but I know that it can never be. It is difficult to +kill hope, though mine is nearly dead. Do not leave me.”</p> +<p>“An-Tak!” Bradley repeated. “You loved a man +called An-Tak?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” replied the girl. “An-Tak was away, +hunting, when the Wieroo caught me. How he must have grieved for +me! He also was cos-ata-lu, twelve moons older than I, and all our +lives we have been together.”</p> +<p>Bradley remained silent. So she loved An-Tak. He hadn’t +the heart to tell her that An-Tak had died, or how.</p> +<p>At the door of Fosh-bal-soj’s storeroom they halted to +listen. No sound came from within, and gently Bradley pushed open +the door. All was inky darkness as they entered; but presently +their eyes became accustomed to the gloom that was partially +relieved by the soft starlight without. The Englishman searched and +found those things for which he had come—two robes, two pairs +of dead wings and several lengths of fiber rope. One pair of the +wings he adjusted to the girl’s shoulders by means of the +rope. Then he draped the robe about her, carrying the cowl over her +head.</p> +<p>He heard her gasp of astonishment when she realized the +ingenuity and boldness of his plan; then he directed her to adjust +the other pair of wings and the robe upon him. Working with strong, +deft fingers she soon had the work completed, and the two stepped +out upon the roof, to all intent and purpose genuine Wieroos. +Besides his pistol Bradley carried the sword of the slain Wieroo +prophet, while the girl was armed with the small blade of the red +Wieroo.</p> +<p>Side by side they walked slowly across the roofs toward the +north edge of the city. Wieroos flapped above them and several +times they passed others walking or sitting upon the roofs. From +the temple still rose the sounds of commotion, now pierced by +occasional shrill screams.</p> +<p>“The murderers are abroad,” whispered the girl. +“Thus will another become the tongue of Luata. It is well for +us, since it keeps them too busy to give the time for searching for +us. They think that we cannot escape the city, and they know that +we cannot leave the island—and so do I.”</p> +<p>Bradley shook his head. “If there is any way, we will find +it,” he said.</p> +<p>“There is no way,” replied the girl.</p> +<p>Bradley made no response, and in silence they continued until +the outer edge of roofs was visible before them. “We are +almost there,” he whispered.</p> +<p>The girl felt for his fingers and pressed them. He could feel +hers trembling as he returned the pressure, nor did he relinquish +her hand; and thus they came to the edge of the last roof.</p> +<p>Here they halted and looked about them. To be seen attempting to +descend to the ground below would be to betray the fact that they +were not Wieroos. Bradley wished that their wings were attached to +their bodies by sinew and muscle rather than by ropes of fiber. A +Wieroo was flapping far overhead. Two more stood near a door a few +yards distant. Standing between these and one of the outer +pedestals that supported one of the numerous skulls Bradley made +one end of a piece of rope fast about the pedestal and dropped the +other end to the ground outside the city. Then they waited.</p> +<p>It was an hour before the coast was entirely clear and then a +moment came when no Wieroo was in sight. “Now!” +whispered Bradley; and the girl grasped the rope and slid over the +edge of the roof into the darkness below. A moment later Bradley +felt two quick pulls upon the rope and immediately followed to the +girl’s side.</p> +<p>Across a narrow clearing they made their way and into a wood +beyond. All night they walked, following the river upward toward +its source, and at dawn they took shelter in a thicket beside the +stream. At no time did they hear the cry of a carnivore, and though +many startled animals fled as they approached, they were not once +menaced by a wild beast. When Bradley expressed surprise at the +absence of the fiercest beasts that are so numerous upon the +mainland of Caprona, the girl explained the reason that is +contained in one of their ancient legends.</p> +<p>“When the Wieroos first developed wings upon which they +could fly, they found this island devoid of any life other than a +few reptiles that live either upon land or in the water and these +only close to the coast. Requiring meat for food the Wieroos +carried to the island such animals as they wished for that purpose. +They still occasionally bring them, and this with the natural +increase keeps them provided with flesh.”</p> +<p>“As it will us,” suggested Bradley.</p> +<p>The first day they remained in hiding, eating only the dried +food that Bradley had brought with him from the temple storeroom, +and the next night they set out again up the river, continuing +steadily on until almost dawn, when they came to low hills where +the river wound through a gorge—it was little more than +rivulet now, the water clear and cold and filled with fish similar +to brook trout though much larger. Not wishing to leave the stream +the two waded along its bed to a spot where the gorge widened +between perpendicular bluffs to a wooded acre of level land. Here +they stopped, for here also the stream ended. They had reached its +source—many cold springs bubbling up from the center of a +little natural amphitheater in the hills and forming a clear and +beautiful pool overshadowed by trees upon one side and bounded by a +little clearing upon the other.</p> +<p>With the coming of the sun they saw they had stumbled upon a +place where they might remain hidden from the Wieroos for a long +time and also one that they could defend against these winged +creatures, since the trees would shield them from an attack from +above and also hamper the movements of the creatures should they +attempt to follow them into the wood.</p> +<p>For three days they rested here before trying to explore the +neighboring country. On the fourth, Bradley stated that he was +going to scale the bluffs and learn what lay beyond. He told the +girl that she should remain in hiding; but she refused to be left, +saying that whatever fate was to be his, she intended to share it, +so that he was at last forced to permit her to come with him. +Through woods at the summit of the bluff they made their way toward +the north and had gone but a short distance when the wood ended and +before them they saw the waters of the inland sea and dimly in the +distance the coveted shore.</p> +<p>The beach lay some two hundred yards from the foot of the hill +on which they stood, nor was there a tree nor any other form of +shelter between them and the water as far up and down the coast as +they could see. Among other plans Bradley had thought of +constructing a covered raft upon which they might drift to the +mainland; but as such a contrivance would necessarily be of +considerable weight, it must be built in the water of the sea, +since they could not hope to move it even a short distance +overland.</p> +<p>“If this wood was only at the edge of the water,” he +sighed.</p> +<p>“But it is not,” the girl reminded him, and then: +“Let us make the best of it. We have escaped from death for a +time at least. We have food and good water and peace and each +other. What more could we have upon the mainland?”</p> +<p>“But I thought you wanted to get back to your own +country!” he exclaimed.</p> +<p>She cast her eyes upon the ground and half turned away. “I +do,” she said, “yet I am happy here. I could be little +happier there.”</p> +<p>Bradley stood in silent thought. “`We have food and good +water and peace and each other!’” he repeated to +himself. He turned then and looked at the girl, and it was as +though in the days that they had been together this was the first +time that he had really seen her. The circumstances that had thrown +them together, the dangers through which they had passed, all the +weird and horrible surroundings that had formed the background of +his knowledge of her had had their effect—she had been but +the companion of an adventure; her self-reliance, her endurance, +her loyalty, had been only what one man might expect of another, +and he saw that he had unconsciously assumed an attitude toward her +that he might have assumed toward a man. Yet there had been a +difference—he recalled now the strange sensation of elation +that had thrilled him upon the occasions when the girl had pressed +his hand in hers, and the depression that had followed her +announcement of her love for An-Tak.</p> +<p>He took a step toward her. A fierce yearning to seize her and +crush her in his arms, swept over him, and then there flashed upon +the screen of recollection the picture of a stately hall set amidst +broad gardens and ancient trees and of a proud old man with +beetling brows—an old man who held his head very +high—and Bradley shook his head and turned away again.</p> +<p>They went back then to their little acre, and the days came and +went, and the man fashioned spear and bow and arrows and hunted +with them that they might have meat, and he made hooks of fishbone +and caught fishes with wondrous flies of his own invention; and the +girl gathered fruits and cooked the flesh and the fish and made +beds of branches and soft grasses. She cured the hides of the +animals he killed and made them soft by much pounding. She made +sandals for herself and for the man and fashioned a hide after the +manner of those worn by the warriors of her tribe and made the man +wear it, for his own garments were in rags.</p> +<p>She was always the same—sweet and kind and +helpful—but always there was about her manner and her +expression just a trace of wistfulness, and often she sat and +looked at the man when he did not know it, her brows puckered in +thought as though she were trying to fathom and to understand +him.</p> +<p>In the face of the cliff, Bradley scooped a cave from the rotted +granite of which the hill was composed, making a shelter for them +against the rains. He brought wood for their cook-fire which they +used only in the middle of the day—a time when there was +little likelihood of Wieroos being in the air so far from their +city—and then he learned to bank it with earth in such a way +that the embers held until the following noon without giving off +smoke.</p> +<p>Always he was planning on reaching the mainland, and never a day +passed that he did not go to the top of the hill and look out +across the sea toward the dark, distant line that meant for him +comparative freedom and possibly reunion with his comrades. The +girl always went with him, standing at his side and watching the +stern expression on his face with just a tinge of sadness on her +own.</p> +<p>“You are not happy,” she said once.</p> +<p>“I should be over there with my men,” he replied. +“I do not know what may have happened to them.”</p> +<p>“I want you to be happy,” she said quite simply; +“but I should be very lonely if you went away and left me +here.”</p> +<p>He put his hand on her shoulder. “I would not do that, +little girl,” he said gently. “If you cannot go with +me, I shall not go. If either of us must go alone, it will be +you.”</p> +<p>Her face lighted to a wondrous smile. “Then we shall not +be separated,” she said, “for I shall never leave you +as long as we both live.”</p> +<p>He looked down into her face for a moment and then: “Who +was An-Tak? ” he asked.</p> +<p>“My brother,” she replied. “Why?”</p> +<p>And then, even less than before, could he tell her. It was then +that he did something he had never done before—he put his +arms about her and stooping, kissed her forehead. “Until you +find An-Tak,” he said, “I will be your +brother.”</p> +<p>She drew away. “I already have a brother,” she said, +“and I do not want another.”</p> +<h3><a id="Ch_5" name="Ch_5"></a>Chapter 5</h3> +<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of +Contents</a></p> +<p>Days became weeks, and weeks became months, and the months +followed one another in a lazy procession of hot, humid days and +warm, humid nights. The fugitives saw never a Wieroo by day though +often at night they heard the melancholy flapping of giant wings +far above them.</p> +<p>Each day was much like its predecessor. Bradley splashed about +for a few minutes in the cold pool early each morning and after a +time the girl tried it and liked it. Toward the center it was deep +enough for swimming, and so he taught her to swim—she was +probably the first human being in all Caspak’s long ages who +had done this thing. And then while she prepared breakfast, the man +shaved—this he never neglected. At first it was a source of +wonderment to the girl, for the Galu men are beardless.</p> +<p>When they needed meat, he hunted, otherwise he busied himself in +improving their shelter, making new and better weapons, perfecting +his knowledge of the girl’s language and teaching her to +speak and to write English—anything that would keep them both +occupied. He still sought new plans for escape, but with +ever-lessening enthusiasm, since each new scheme presented some +insurmountable obstacle.</p> +<p>And then one day as a bolt out of a clear sky came that which +blasted the peace and security of their sanctuary forever. Bradley +was just emerging from the water after his morning plunge when from +overhead came the sound of flapping wings. Glancing quickly up the +man saw a white-robed Wieroo circling slowly above him. That he had +been discovered he could not doubt since the creature even dropped +to a lower altitude as though to assure itself that what it saw was +a man. Then it rose rapidly and winged away toward the city.</p> +<p>For two days Bradley and the girl lived in a constant state of +apprehension, awaiting the moment when the hunters would come for +them; but nothing happened until just after dawn of the third day, +when the flapping of wings apprised them of the approach of +Wieroos. Together they went to the edge of the wood and looked up +to see five red-robed creatures dropping slowly in ever-lessening +spirals toward their little amphitheater. With no attempt at +concealment they came, sure of their ability to overwhelm these two +fugitives, and with the fullest measure of self-confidence they +landed in the clearing but a few yards from the man and the +girl.</p> +<p>Following a plan already discussed Bradley and the girl +retreated slowly into the woods. The Wieroos advanced, calling upon +them to give themselves up; but the quarry made no reply. Farther +and farther into the little wood Bradley led the hunters, +permitting them to approach ever closer; then he circled back again +toward the clearing, evidently to the great delight of the Wieroos, +who now followed more leisurely, awaiting the moment when they +should be beyond the trees and able to use their wings. They had +opened into semicircular formation now with the evident intention +of cutting the two off from returning into the wood. Each Wieroo +advanced with his curved blade ready in his hand, each hideous face +blank and expressionless.</p> +<p>It was then that Bradley opened fire with his pistol—three +shots, aimed with careful deliberation, for it had been long since +he had used the weapon, and he could not afford to chance wasting +ammunition on misses. At each shot a Wieroo dropped; and then the +remaining two sought escape by flight, screaming and wailing after +the manner of their kind. When a Wieroo runs, his wings spread +almost without any volition upon his part, since from time +immemorial he has always used them to balance himself and +accelerate his running speed so that in the open they appear to +skim the surface of the ground when in the act of running. But here +in the woods, among the close-set boles, the spreading of their +wings proved their undoing—it hindered and stopped them and +threw them to the ground, and then Bradley was upon them +threatening them with instant death if they did not +surrender— promising them their freedom if they did his +bidding.</p> +<p>“As you have seen,” he cried, “I can kill you +when I wish and at a distance. You cannot escape me. Your only hope +of life lies in obedience. Quick, or I kill!”</p> +<p>The Wieroos stopped and faced him. “What do you want of +us?” asked one.</p> +<p>“Throw aside your weapons,” Bradley commanded. After +a moment’s hesitation they obeyed.</p> +<p>“Now approach!” A great plan—the only +plan—had suddenly come to him like an inspiration.</p> +<p>The Wieroos came closer and halted at his command. Bradley +turned to the girl. “There is rope in the shelter,” he +said. “Fetch it!”</p> +<p>She did as he bid, and then he directed her to fasten one end of +a fifty-foot length to the ankle of one of the Wieroos and the +opposite end to the second. The creatures gave evidence of great +fear, but they dared not attempt to prevent the act.</p> +<p>“Now go out into the clearing,” said Bradley, +“and remember that I am walking close behind and that I will +shoot the nearer one should either attempt to escape—that +will hold the other until I can kill him as well.”</p> +<p>In the open he halted them. “The girl will get upon the +back of the one in front,” announced the Englishman. “I +will mount the other. She carries a sharp blade, and I carry this +weapon that you know kills easily at a distance. If you disobey in +the slightest, the instructions that I am about to give you, you +shall both die. That we must die with you, will not deter us. If +you obey, I promise to set you free without harming you.</p> +<p>“You will carry us due west, depositing us upon the shore +of the mainland—that is all. It is the price of your lives. +Do you agree?”</p> +<p>Sullenly the Wieroos acquiesced. Bradley examined the knots that +held the rope to their ankles, and feeling them secure directed the +girl to mount the back of the leading Wieroo, himself upon the +other. Then he gave the signal for the two to rise together. With +loud flapping of the powerful wings the creatures took to the air, +circling once before they topped the trees upon the hill and then +taking a course due west out over the waters of the sea.</p> +<p>Nowhere about them could Bradley see signs of other Wieroos, nor +of those other menaces which he had feared might bring disaster to +his plans for escape—the huge, winged reptilia that are so +numerous above the southern areas of Caspak and which are often +seen, though in lesser numbers, farther north.</p> +<p>Nearer and nearer loomed the mainland—a broad, parklike +expanse stretching inland to the foot of a low plateau spread out +before them. The little dots in the foreground became grazing herds +of deer and antelope and bos; a huge woolly rhinoceros wallowed in +a mudhole to the right, and beyond, a mighty mammoth culled the +tender shoots from a tall tree. The roars and screams and growls of +giant carnivora came faintly to their ears. Ah, this was Caspak. +With all of its dangers and its primal savagery it brought a +fullness to the throat of the Englishman as to one who sees and +hears the familiar sights and sounds of home after a long absence. +Then the Wieroos dropped swiftly downward to the flower-starred +turf that grew almost to the water’s edge, the fugitives +slipped from their backs, and Bradley told the red-robed creatures +they were free to go.</p> +<p>When he had cut the ropes from their ankles they rose with that +uncanny wailing upon their lips that always brought a shudder to +the Englishman, and upon dismal wings they flapped away toward +frightful Oo-oh.</p> +<p>When the creatures had gone, the girl turned toward Bradley. +“Why did you have them bring us here?” she asked. +“Now we are far from my country. We may never live to reach +it, as we are among enemies who, while not so horrible will kill us +just as surely as would the Wieroos should they capture us, and we +have before us many marches through lands filled with savage +beasts.”</p> +<p>“There were two reasons,” replied Bradley. +“You told me that there are two Wieroo cities at the eastern +end of the island. To have passed near either of them might have +been to have brought about our heads hundreds of the creatures from +whom we could not possibly have escaped. Again, my friends must be +near this spot— it cannot be over two marches to the fort of +which I have told you. It is my duty to return to them. If they +still live we shall find a way to return you to your +people.”</p> +<p>“And you?” asked the girl.</p> +<p>“I escaped from Oo-oh,” replied Bradley. “I +have accomplished the impossible once, and so I shall accomplish it +again—I shall escape from Caspak.”</p> +<p>He was not looking at her face as he answered her, and so he did +not see the shadow of sorrow that crossed her countenance. When he +raised his eyes again, she was smiling.</p> +<p>“What you wish, I wish,” said the girl.</p> +<p>Southward along the coast they made their way following the +beach, where the walking was best, but always keeping close enough +to trees to insure sanctuary from the beasts and reptiles that so +often menaced them. It was late in the afternoon when the girl +suddenly seized Bradley’s arm and pointed straight ahead +along the shore. “What is that?” she whispered. +“What strange reptile is it?”</p> +<p>Bradley looked in the direction her slim forefinger indicated. +He rubbed his eyes and looked again, and then he seized her wrist +and drew her quickly behind a clump of bushes.</p> +<p>“What is it?” she asked.</p> +<p>“It is the most frightful reptile that the waters of the +world have ever known,” he replied. “It is a German +U-boat!”</p> +<p>An expression of amazement and understanding lighted her +features. “It is the thing of which you told me,” she +exclaimed, “—the thing that swims under the water and +carries men in its belly!”</p> +<p>“It is,” replied Bradley.</p> +<p>“Then why do you hide from it?” asked the girl. +“You said that now it belonged to your friends.”</p> +<p>“Many months have passed since I knew what was going on +among my friends,” he replied. “I cannot know what has +befallen them. They should have been gone from here in this vessel +long since, and so I cannot understand why it is still here. I am +going to investigate first before I show myself. When I left, there +were more Germans on the U-33 than there were men of my own party +at the fort, and I have had sufficient experience of Germans to +know that they will bear watching—if they have not been +properly watched since I left.”</p> +<p>Making their way through a fringe of wood that grew a few yards +inland the two crept unseen toward the U-boat which lay moored to +the shore at a point which Bradley now recognized as being near the +oil-pool north of Dinosaur. As close as possible to the vessel they +halted, crouching low among the dense vegetation, and watched the +boat for signs of human life about it. The hatches were +closed—no one could be seen or heard. For five minutes +Bradley watched, and then he determined to board the submarine and +investigate. He had risen to carry his decision into effect when +there suddenly broke upon his ear, uttered in loud and menacing +tones, a volley of German oaths and expletives among which he heard +Englische schweinhunde repeated several times. The voice did not +come from the direction of the U-boat; but from inland. Creeping +forward Bradley reached a spot where, through the creepers hanging +from the trees, he could see a party of men coming down toward the +shore.</p> +<p>He saw Baron Friedrich von Schoenvorts and six of his +men—all armed—while marching in a little knot among +them were Olson, Brady, Sinclair, Wilson, and Whitely.</p> +<p>Bradley knew nothing of the disappearance of Bowen Tyler and +Miss La Rue, nor of the perfidy of the Germans in shelling the fort +and attempting to escape in the U-33; but he was in no way +surprised at what he saw before him.</p> +<p>The little party came slowly onward, the prisoners staggering +beneath heavy cans of oil, while Schwartz, one of the German +noncommissioned officers cursed and beat them with a stick of wood, +impartially. Von Schoenvorts walked in the rear of the column, +encouraging Schwartz and laughing at the discomfiture of the +Britishers. Dietz, Heinz, and Klatz also seemed to enjoy the +entertainment immensely; but two of the men—Plesser and +Hindle— marched with eyes straight to the front and with +scowling faces.</p> +<p>Bradley felt his blood boil at sight of the cowardly indignities +being heaped upon his men, and in the brief span of time occupied +by the column to come abreast of where he lay hidden he made his +plans, foolhardy though he knew them. Then he drew the girl close +to him. “Stay here,” he whispered. “I am going +out to fight those beasts; but I shall be killed. Do not let them +see you. Do not let them take you alive. They are more cruel, more +cowardly, more bestial than the Wieroos.”</p> +<p>The girl pressed close to him, her face very white. “Go, +if that is right,” she whispered; “but if you die, I +shall die, for I cannot live without you.” He looked sharply +into her eyes. “Oh!” he ejaculated. “What an +idiot I have been! Nor could I live without you, little +girl.” And he drew her very close and kissed her lips. +“Good-bye.” He disengaged himself from her arms and +looked again in time to see that the rear of the column had just +passed him. Then he rose and leaped quickly and silently from the +jungle.</p> +<p>Suddenly von Schoenvorts felt an arm thrown about his neck and +his pistol jerked from its holster. He gave a cry of fright and +warning, and his men turned to see a half-naked white man holding +their leader securely from behind and aiming a pistol at them over +his shoulder.</p> +<p>“Drop those guns!” came in short, sharp syllables +and perfect German from the lips of the newcomer. “Drop them +or I’ll put a bullet through the back of von +Schoenvorts’ head.”</p> +<p>The Germans hesitated for a moment, looking first toward von +Schoenvorts and then to Schwartz, who was evidently second in +command, for orders.</p> +<p>“It’s the English pig, Bradley,” shouted the +latter, “and he’s alone—go and get +him!”</p> +<p>“Go yourself,” growled Plesser. Hindle moved close +to the side of Plesser and whispered something to him. The latter +nodded. Suddenly von Schoenvorts wheeled about and seized +Bradley’s pistol arm with both hands, “Now!” he +shouted. “Come and take him, quick!”</p> +<p>Schwartz and three others leaped forward; but Plesser and Hindle +held back, looking questioningly toward the English prisoners. Then +Plesser spoke. “Now is your chance, Englander,” he +called in low tones. “Seize Hindle and me and take our guns +from us—we will not fight hard.”</p> +<p>Olson and Brady were not long in acting upon the suggestion. +They had seen enough of the brutal treatment von Schoenvorts +accorded his men and the especially venomous attentions he had +taken great enjoyment in according Plesser and Hindle to understand +that these two might be sincere in a desire for revenge. In another +moment the two Germans were unarmed and Olson and Brady were +running to the support of Bradley; but already it seemed too +late.</p> +<p>Von Schoenvorts had managed to drag the Englishman around so +that his back was toward Schwartz and the other advancing Germans. +Schwartz was almost upon Bradley with gun clubbed and ready to +smash down upon the Englishman’s skull. Brady and Olson were +charging the Germans in the rear with Wilson, Whitely, and Sinclair +supporting them with bare fists. It seemed that Bradley was doomed +when, apparently out of space, an arrow whizzed, striking Schwartz +in the side, passing half-way through his body to crumple him to +earth. With a shriek the man fell, and at the same time Olson and +Brady saw the slim figure of a young girl standing at the edge of +the jungle coolly fitting another arrow to her bow.</p> +<p>Bradley had now succeeded in wrestling his arm free from von +Schoenvorts’ grip and in dropping the latter with a blow from +the butt of his pistol. The rest of the English and Germans were +engaged in a hand-to-hand encounter. Plesser and Hindle standing +aside from the melee and urging their comrades to surrender and +join with the English against the tyranny of von Schoenvorts. Heinz +and Klatz, possibly influenced by their exhortation, were putting +up but a half-hearted resistance; but Dietz, a huge, bearded, +bull-necked Prussian, yelling like a maniac, sought to exterminate +the Englische schweinhunde with his bayonet, fearing to fire his +piece lest he kill some of his comrades.</p> +<p>It was Olson who engaged him, and though unused to the long +German rifle and bayonet, he met the bull-rush of the Hun with the +cold, cruel precision and science of English bayonet-fighting. +There was no feinting, no retiring and no parrying that was not +also an attack. Bayonet-fighting today is not a pretty thing to +see—it is not an artistic fencing-match in which men give and +take—it is slaughter inevitable and quickly over.</p> +<p>Dietz lunged once madly at Olson’s throat. A short point, +with just a twist of the bayonet to the left sent the sharp blade +over the Englishman’s left shoulder. Instantly he stepped +close in, dropped his rifle through his hands and grasped it with +both hands close below the muzzle and with a short, sharp jab sent +his blade up beneath Dietz’s chin to the brain. So quickly +was the thing done and so quick the withdrawal that Olson had +wheeled to take on another adversary before the German’s +corpse had toppled to the ground.</p> +<p>But there were no more adversaries to take on. Heinz and Klatz +had thrown down their rifles and with hands above their heads were +crying “Kamerad! Kamerad!” at the tops of their voices. +Von Schoenvorts still lay where he had fallen. Plesser and Hindle +were explaining to Bradley that they were glad of the outcome of +the fight, as they could no longer endure the brutality of the +U-boat commander.</p> +<p>The remainder of the men were looking at the girl who now +advanced slowly, her bow ready, when Bradley turned toward her and +held out his hand.</p> +<p>“Co-Tan,” he said, “unstring your +bow—these are my friends, and yours.” And to the +Englishmen: “This is Co-Tan. You who saw her save me from +Schwartz know a part of what I owe her.”</p> +<p>The rough men gathered about the girl, and when she spoke to +them in broken English, with a smile upon her lips enhancing the +charm of her irresistible accent, each and every one of them +promptly fell in love with her and constituted himself henceforth +her guardian and her slave.</p> +<p>A moment later the attention of each was called to Plesser by a +volley of invective. They turned in time to see the man running +toward von Schoenvorts who was just rising from the ground. Plesser +carried a rifle with bayonet fixed, that he had snatched from the +side of Dietz’s corpse. Von Schoenvorts’ face was livid +with fear, his jaws working as though he would call for help; but +no sound came from his blue lips.</p> +<p>“You struck me,” shrieked Plesser. “Once, +twice, three times, you struck me, pig. You murdered +Schwerke—you drove him insane by your cruelty until he took +his own life. You are only one of your kind—they are all like +you from the Kaiser down. I wish that you were the Kaiser. Thus +would I do!” And he lunged his bayonet through von +Schoenvorts’ chest. Then he let his rifle fall with the dying +man and wheeled toward Bradley. “Here I am,” he said. +“Do with me as you like. All my life I have been kicked and +cuffed by such as that, and yet always have I gone out when they +commanded, singing, to give up my life if need be to keep them in +power. Only lately have I come to know what a fool I have been. But +now I am no longer a fool, and besides, I am avenged and Schwerke +is avenged, so you can kill me if you wish. Here I am.”</p> +<p>“If I was after bein’ the king,” said Olson, +“I’d pin the V.C. on your noble chist; but bein’ +only an Irishman with a Swede name, for which God forgive me, the +bist I can do is shake your hand.”</p> +<p>“You will not be punished,” said Bradley. +“There are four of you left—if you four want to come +along and work with us, we will take you; but you will come as +prisoners.”</p> +<p>“It suits me,” said Plesser. “Now that the +captain-lieutenant is dead you need not fear us. All our lives we +have known nothing but to obey his class. If I had not killed him, +I suppose I would be fool enough to obey him again; but he is dead. +Now we will obey you—we must obey some one.”</p> +<p>“And you?” Bradley turned to the other survivors of +the original crew of the U-33. Each promised obedience.</p> +<p>The two dead Germans were buried in a single grave, and then the +party boarded the submarine and stowed away the oil.</p> +<p>Here Bradley told the men what had befallen him since the night +of September 14th when he had disappeared so mysteriously from the +camp upon the plateau. Now he learned for the first time that Bowen +J. Tyler, Jr., and Miss La Rue had been missing even longer than he +and that no faintest trace of them had been discovered.</p> +<p>Olson told him of how the Germans had returned and waited in +ambush for them outside the fort, capturing them that they might be +used to assist in the work of refining the oil and later in manning +the U-33, and Plesser told briefly of the experiences of the German +crew under von Schoenvorts since they had escaped from Caspak +months before—of how they lost their bearings after having +been shelled by ships they had attempted to sneak farther north and +how at last with provisions gone and fuel almost exhausted they had +sought and at last found, more by accident than design, the +mysterious island they had once been so glad to leave behind.</p> +<p>“Now,” announced Bradley, “we’ll plan +for the future. The boat has fuel, provisions and water for a +month, I believe you said, Plesser; there are ten of us to man it. +We have a last sad duty here—we must search for Miss La Rue +and Mr. Tyler. I say a sad duty because we know that we shall not +find them; but it is none the less our duty to comb the shoreline, +firing signal shells at intervals, that we at least may leave at +last with full knowledge that we have done all that men might do to +locate them.”</p> +<p>None dissented from this conviction, nor was there a voice +raised in protest against the plan to at least make assurance +doubly sure before quitting Caspak forever.</p> +<p>And so they started, cruising slowly up the coast and firing an +occasional shot from the gun. Often the vessel was brought to a +stop, and always there were anxious eyes scanning the shore for an +answering signal. Late in the afternoon they caught sight of a +number of Band-lu warriors; but when the vessel approached the +shore and the natives realized that human beings stood upon the +back of the strange monster of the sea, they fled in terror before +Bradley could come within hailing distance.</p> +<p>That night they dropped anchor at the mouth of a sluggish stream +whose warm waters swarmed with millions of tiny tadpolelike +organisms—minute human spawn starting on their precarious +journey from some inland pool toward “the +beginning”—a journey which one in millions, perhaps, +might survive to complete. Already almost at the inception of life +they were being greeted by thousands of voracious mouths as fish +and reptiles of many kinds fought to devour them, the while other +and larger creatures pursued the devourers, to be, in turn, preyed +upon by some other of the countless forms that inhabit the deeps of +Caprona’s frightful sea.</p> +<p>The second day was practically a repetition of the first. They +moved very slowly with frequent stops and once they landed in the +Kro-lu country to hunt. Here they were attacked by the +bow-and-arrow men, whom they could not persuade to palaver with +them. So belligerent were the natives that it became necessary to +fire into them in order to escape their persistent and ferocious +attentions.</p> +<p>“What chance,” asked Bradley, as they were returning +to the boat with their game, “could Tyler and Miss La Rue +have had among such as these?”</p> +<p>But they continued on their fruitless quest, and the third day, +after cruising along the shore of a deep inlet, they passed a line +of lofty cliffs that formed the southern shore of the inlet and +rounded a sharp promontory about noon. Co-Tan and Bradley were on +deck alone, and as the new shoreline appeared beyond the point, the +girl gave an exclamation of joy and seized the man’s hand in +hers.</p> +<p>“Oh, look!” she cried. “The Galu country! The +Galu country! It is my country that I never thought to see +again.”</p> +<p>“You are glad to come again, Co-Tan?” asked +Bradley.</p> +<p>“Oh, so glad!” she cried. “And you will come +with me to my people? We may live here among them, and you will be +a great warrior—oh, when Jor dies you may even be chief, for +there is none so mighty as my warrior. You will come?”</p> +<p>Bradley shook his head. “I cannot, little Co-Tan,” +he answered. “My country needs me, and I must go back. Maybe +someday I shall return. You will not forget me, Co-Tan?”</p> +<p>She looked at him in wide-eyed wonder. “You are going away +from me?” she asked in a very small voice. “You are +going away from Co-Tan?”</p> +<p>Bradley looked down upon the little bowed head. He felt the soft +cheek against his bare arm; and he felt something else there +too— hot drops of moisture that ran down to his very +finger-tips and splashed, but each one wrung from a woman’s +heart.</p> +<p>He bent low and raised the tear-stained face to his own. +“No, Co-Tan,” he said, “I am not going away from +you—for you are going with me. You are going back to my own +country to be my wife. Tell me that you will, Co-Tan.” And he +bent still lower yet from his height and kissed her lips. Nor did +he need more than the wonderful new light in her eyes to tell him +that she would go to the end of the world with him if he would but +take her. And then the gun-crew came up from below again to fire a +signal shot, and the two were brought down from the high heaven of +their new happiness to the scarred and weather-beaten deck of the +U-33.</p> +<p>An hour later the vessel was running close in by a shore of +wondrous beauty beside a parklike meadow that stretched back a mile +inland to the foot of a plateau when Whitely called attention to a +score of figures clambering downward from the elevation to the +lowland below. The engines were reversed and the boat brought to a +stop while all hands gathered on deck to watch the little party +coming toward them across the meadow.</p> +<p>“They are Galus,” cried Co-Tan; “they are my +own people. Let me speak to them lest they think we come to fight +them. Put me ashore, my man, and I will go meet them.”</p> +<p>The nose of the U-boat was run close in to the steep bank; but +when Co-Tan would have run forward alone, Bradley seized her hand +and held her back. “I will go with you, Co-Tan,” he +said; and together they advanced to meet the oncoming party.</p> +<p>There were about twenty warriors moving forward in a thin line, +as our infantry advance as skirmishers. Bradley could not but +notice the marked difference between this formation and the moblike +methods of the lower tribes he had come in contact with, and he +commented upon it to Co-Tan.</p> +<p>“Galu warriors always advance into battle thus,” she +said. “The lesser people remain in a huddled group where they +can scarce use their weapons the while they present so big a mark +to us that our spears and arrows cannot miss them; but when they +hurl theirs at our warriors, if they miss the first man, there is +no chance that they will kill some one behind him.</p> +<p>“Stand still now,” she cautioned, “and fold +your arms. They will not harm us then.”</p> +<p>Bradley did as he was bid, and the two stood with arms folded as +the line of warriors approached. When they had come within some +fifty yards, they halted and one spoke. “Who are you and from +whence do you come?” he asked; and then Co-Tan gave a little, +glad cry and sprang forward with out-stretched arms.</p> +<p>“Oh, Tan!” she exclaimed. “Do you not know +your little Co-Tan?”</p> +<p>The warrior stared, incredulous, for a moment, and then he, too, +ran forward and when they met, took the girl in his arms. It was +then that Bradley experienced to the full a sensation that was new +to him—a sudden hatred for the strange warrior before him and +a desire to kill without knowing why he would kill. He moved +quickly to the girl’s side and grasped her wrist.</p> +<p>“Who is this man?” he demanded in cold tones.</p> +<p>Co-Tan turned a surprised face toward the Englishman and then of +a sudden broke forth into a merry peal of laughter. “This is +my father, Brad-lee,” she cried.</p> +<p>“And who is Brad-lee?” demanded the warrior.</p> +<p>“He is my man,” replied Co-Tan simply.</p> +<p>“By what right?” insisted Tan.</p> +<p>And then she told him briefly of all that she had passed through +since the Wieroos had stolen her and of how Bradley had rescued her +and sought to rescue An-Tak, her brother.</p> +<p>“You are satisfied with him?” asked Tan.</p> +<p>“Yes,” replied the girl proudly.</p> +<p>It was then that Bradley’s attention was attracted to the +edge of the plateau by a movement there, and looking closely he saw +a horse bearing two figures sliding down the steep declivity. Once +at the bottom, the animal came charging across the meadowland at a +rapid run. It was a magnificent animal—a great bay stallion +with a white-blazed face and white forelegs to the knees, its +barrel encircled by a broad surcingle of white; and as it came to a +sudden stop beside Tan, the Englishman saw that it bore a man and a +girl—a tall man and a girl as beautiful as Co-Tan. When the +girl espied the latter, she slid from the horse and ran toward her, +fairly screaming for joy.</p> +<p>The man dismounted and stood beside Tan. Like Bradley he was +garbed after the fashion of the surrounding warriors; but there was +a subtle difference between him and his companion. Possibly he +detected a similar difference in Bradley, for his first question +was, “From what country?” and though he spoke in Galu +Bradley thought he detected an accent.</p> +<p>“England,” replied Bradley.</p> +<p>A broad smile lighted the newcomer’s face as he held out +his hand. “I am Tom Billings of Santa Monica, +California,” he said. “I know all about you, and +I’m mighty glad to find you alive.”</p> +<p>“How did you get here?” asked Bradley. “I +thought ours was the only party of men from the outer world ever to +enter Caprona.”</p> +<p>“It was, until we came in search of Bowen J. Tyler, +Jr.,” replied Billings. “We found him and sent him home +with his bride; but I was kept a prisoner here.”</p> +<p>Bradley’s face darkened—then they were not among +friends after all. “There are ten of us down there on a +German sub with small-arms and a gun,” he said quickly in +English. “It will be no trick to get away from these +people.”</p> +<p>“You don’t know my jailer,” replied Billings, +“or you’d not be so sure. Wait, I’ll introduce +you.” And then turning to the girl who had accompanied him he +called her by name. “Ajor,” he said, “permit me +to introduce Lieutenant Bradley; Lieutenant, Mrs. Billings—my +jailer!”</p> +<p>The Englishman laughed as he shook hands with the girl. +“You are not as good a soldier as I,” he said to +Billings. “Instead of being taken prisoner myself I have +taken one—Mrs. Bradley, this is Mr. Billings.”</p> +<p>Ajor, quick to understand, turned toward Co-Tan. “You are +going back with him to his country?” she asked. Co-Tan +admitted it.</p> +<p>“You dare?” asked Ajor. “But your father will +not permit it— Jor, my father, High Chief of the Galus, will +not permit it, for like me you are cos-ata-lo. Oh, Co-Tan, if we +but could! How I would love to see all the strange and wonderful +things of which my Tom tells me!”</p> +<p>Bradley bent and whispered in her ear. “Say the word and +you may both go with us.”</p> +<p>Billings heard and speaking in English, asked Ajor if she would +go.</p> +<p>“Yes,” she answered, “If you wish it; but you +know, my Tom, that if Jor captures us, both you and Co-Tan’s +man will pay the penalty with your lives—not even his love +for me nor his admiration for you can save you.”</p> +<p>Bradley noticed that she spoke in English—broken English +like Co-Tan’s but equally appealing. “We can easily get +you aboard the ship,” he said, “on some pretext or +other, and then we can steam away. They can neither harm nor detain +us, nor will we have to fire a shot at them.”</p> +<p>And so it was done, Bradley and Co-Tan taking Ajor and Billings +aboard to “show” them the vessel, which almost +immediately raised anchor and moved slowly out into the sea.</p> +<p>“I hate to do it,” said Billings. “They have +been fine to me. Jor and Tan are splendid men and they will think +me an ingrate; but I can’t waste my life here when there is +so much to be done in the outer world.”</p> +<p>As they steamed down the inland sea past the island of Oo-oh, +the stories of their adventures were retold, and Bradley learned +that Bowen Tyler and his bride had left the Galu country but a +fortnight before and that there was every reason to believe that +the Toreador might still be lying in the Pacific not far off the +subterranean mouth of the river which emitted Caprona’s +heated waters into the ocean.</p> +<p>Late in the second day, after running through swarms of hideous +reptiles, they submerged at the point where the river entered +beneath the cliffs and shortly after rose to the sunlit surface of +the Pacific; but nowhere as far as they could see was sign of +another craft. Down the coast they steamed toward the beach where +Billings had made his crossing in the hydro-aeroplane and just at +dusk the lookout announced a light dead ahead. It proved to be +aboard the Toreador, and a half-hour later there was such a reunion +on the deck of the trig little yacht as no one there had ever +dreamed might be possible. Of the Allies there were only Tippet and +James to be mourned, and no one mourned any of the Germans dead nor +Benson, the traitor, whose ugly story was first told in Bowen +Tyler’s manuscript.</p> +<p>Tyler and the rescue party had but just reached the yacht that +afternoon. They had heard, faintly, the signal shots fired by the +U-33 but had been unable to locate their direction and so had +assumed that they had come from the guns of the Toreador.</p> +<p>It was a happy party that sailed north toward sunny, southern +California, the old U-33 trailing in the wake of the Toreador and +flying with the latter the glorious Stars and Stripes beneath which +she had been born in the shipyard at Santa Monica. Three newly +married couples, their bonds now duly solemnized by the master of +the ship, joyed in the peace and security of the untracked waters +of the south Pacific and the unique honeymoon which, had it not +been for stern duty ahead, they could have wished protracted till +the end of time.</p> +<p>And so they came one day to dock at the shipyard which Bowen +Tyler now controlled, and here the U-33 still lies while those who +passed so many eventful days within and because of her, have gone +their various ways.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<pre> +I have made the following changes to the text: + +PAGE LINE ORIGINAL CHANGED TO + 10 12 of or + 14 19 of animals life of animals + 31 26 is arms his arms + 37 14 above this above his + 37 23 Bradley, Bradley + 54 18 man man + 57 14 and of Oo-oh of Oo-oh + 62 18 spend spent + 63 31 and mumbled the mumbled + 64 9 things thing + 80 30 east cast + 104 16 proaching proached + 106 30 cos-at-lu cos-ata-lu + 126 17 not artistic not an artistic + 126 25 close below hands close below + 130 1 internals intervals + 132 9 than that + 132 10 splashes splashed + 134 3 know know not know + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Out of Time's Abyss +by Edgar Rice Burroughs + + +</pre> +</body> +</html> |