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Authors: Edgar Rice Burroughs
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and
heartless mortals, knowing no more of the real life to come than we do.
“Not only is it our right to bend every effort to escape—it is a
solemn duty from which we should not shrink even though we know that we
should be reviled and tortured by our own peoples when we returned to
them.
“Only thus may we carry the truth to those without, and though the
likelihood of our narrative being given credence is, I grant you,
remote, so wedded are mortals to their stupid infatuation for
impossible superstitions, we should be craven cowards indeed were we to
shirk the plain duty which confronts us.
“Again there is a chance that with the weight of the testimony of
several of us the truth of our statements may be accepted, and at least
a compromise effected which will result in the dispatching of an
expedition of investigation to this hideous mockery of heaven.”
Both the girl and the green warrior stood silent in thought for some
moments. The former it was who eventually broke the silence.
“Never had I considered the matter in that light before,” she said.
“Indeed would I give my life a thousand times if I could but save a
single soul from the awful life that I have led in this cruel place.
Yes, you are right, and I will go with you as far as we can go; but I
doubt that we ever shall escape.”
I turned an inquiring glance toward the Thark.
“To the gates of Issus, or to the bottom of Korus,” spoke the green
warrior; “to the snows to the north or to the snows to the south, Tars
Tarkas follows where John Carter leads. I have spoken.”
“Come, then,” I cried, “we must make the start, for we could not be
further from escape than we now are in the heart of this mountain and
within the four walls of this chamber of death.”
“Come, then,” said the girl, “but do not flatter yourself that you can
find no worse place than this within the territory of the therns.”
So saying she swung the secret panel that separated us from the
apartment in which I had found her, and we stepped through once more
into the presence of the other prisoners.
There were in all ten red Martians, men and women, and when we had
briefly explained our plan they decided to join forces with us, though
it was evident that it was with some considerable misgivings that they
thus tempted fate by opposing an ancient superstition, even though each
knew through cruel experience the fallacy of its entire fabric.
Thuvia, the girl whom I had first freed, soon had the others at
liberty. Tars Tarkas and I stripped the bodies of the two therns of
their weapons, which included swords, daggers, and two revolvers of the
curious and deadly type manufactured by the red Martians.
We distributed the weapons as far as they would go among our followers,
giving the firearms to two of the women; Thuvia being one so armed.
With the latter as our guide we set off rapidly but cautiously through
a maze of passages, crossing great chambers hewn from the solid metal
of the cliff, following winding corridors, ascending steep inclines,
and now and again concealing ourselves in dark recesses at the sound of
approaching footsteps.
Our destination, Thuvia said, was a distant storeroom where arms and
ammunition in plenty might be found. From there she was to lead us to
the summit of the cliffs, from where it would require both wondrous wit
and mighty fighting to win our way through the very heart of the
stronghold of the Holy Therns to the world without.
“And even then, O Prince,” she cried, “the arm of the Holy Thern is
long. It reaches to every nation of Barsoom. His secret temples are
hidden in the heart of every community. Wherever we go should we
escape we shall find that word of our coming has preceded us, and death
awaits us before we may pollute the air with our blasphemies.”
We had proceeded for possibly an hour without serious interruption, and
Thuvia had just whispered to me that we were approaching our first
destination, when on entering a
heartless mortals, knowing no more of the real life to come than we do.
“Not only is it our right to bend every effort to escape—it is a
solemn duty from which we should not shrink even though we know that we
should be reviled and tortured by our own peoples when we returned to
them.
“Only thus may we carry the truth to those without, and though the
likelihood of our narrative being given credence is, I grant you,
remote, so wedded are mortals to their stupid infatuation for
impossible superstitions, we should be craven cowards indeed were we to
shirk the plain duty which confronts us.
“Again there is a chance that with the weight of the testimony of
several of us the truth of our statements may be accepted, and at least
a compromise effected which will result in the dispatching of an
expedition of investigation to this hideous mockery of heaven.”
Both the girl and the green warrior stood silent in thought for some
moments. The former it was who eventually broke the silence.
“Never had I considered the matter in that light before,” she said.
“Indeed would I give my life a thousand times if I could but save a
single soul from the awful life that I have led in this cruel place.
Yes, you are right, and I will go with you as far as we can go; but I
doubt that we ever shall escape.”
I turned an inquiring glance toward the Thark.
“To the gates of Issus, or to the bottom of Korus,” spoke the green
warrior; “to the snows to the north or to the snows to the south, Tars
Tarkas follows where John Carter leads. I have spoken.”
“Come, then,” I cried, “we must make the start, for we could not be
further from escape than we now are in the heart of this mountain and
within the four walls of this chamber of death.”
“Come, then,” said the girl, “but do not flatter yourself that you can
find no worse place than this within the territory of the therns.”
So saying she swung the secret panel that separated us from the
apartment in which I had found her, and we stepped through once more
into the presence of the other prisoners.
There were in all ten red Martians, men and women, and when we had
briefly explained our plan they decided to join forces with us, though
it was evident that it was with some considerable misgivings that they
thus tempted fate by opposing an ancient superstition, even though each
knew through cruel experience the fallacy of its entire fabric.
Thuvia, the girl whom I had first freed, soon had the others at
liberty. Tars Tarkas and I stripped the bodies of the two therns of
their weapons, which included swords, daggers, and two revolvers of the
curious and deadly type manufactured by the red Martians.
We distributed the weapons as far as they would go among our followers,
giving the firearms to two of the women; Thuvia being one so armed.
With the latter as our guide we set off rapidly but cautiously through
a maze of passages, crossing great chambers hewn from the solid metal
of the cliff, following winding corridors, ascending steep inclines,
and now and again concealing ourselves in dark recesses at the sound of
approaching footsteps.
Our destination, Thuvia said, was a distant storeroom where arms and
ammunition in plenty might be found. From there she was to lead us to
the summit of the cliffs, from where it would require both wondrous wit
and mighty fighting to win our way through the very heart of the
stronghold of the Holy Therns to the world without.
“And even then, O Prince,” she cried, “the arm of the Holy Thern is
long. It reaches to every nation of Barsoom. His secret temples are
hidden in the heart of every community. Wherever we go should we
escape we shall find that word of our coming has preceded us, and death
awaits us before we may pollute the air with our blasphemies.”
We had proceeded for possibly an hour without serious interruption, and
Thuvia had just whispered to me that we were approaching our first
destination, when on entering a
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