A Princess of Mars Rethroned

by Edna Rice Burroughs

CHAPTER XX

  IN THE ATMOSPHERE FACTORY

  For two days I waited there for Kantoa Kan, but as she did not come I started off on foot in a northwesterly direction toward a point where she had told me lay the nearest waterway. My only food consisted of vegetable milk from the plants which gave so bounteously of this priceless fluid.

  Through two long weeks I wandered, stumbling through the nights guided only by the stars and hiding during the days behind some protruding rock or among the occasional hills I traversed. Several times I was attacked by wild beasts; strange, uncouth monstrosities that leaped upon me in the dark, so that I had ever to grasp my long-sword in my hand that I might be ready for them. Usually my strange, newly acquired telepathic power warned me in ample time, but once I was down with vicious fangs at my jugular and a hairy face pressed close to mine before I knew that I was even threatened.

  What manner of thing was upon me I did not know, but that it was large and heavy and many-legged I could feel. My hands were at its throat before the fangs had a chance to bury themselves in my neck, and slowly I forced the hairy face from me and closed my fingers, vise-like, upon its windpipe.

  Without sound we lay there, the beast exerting every effort to reach me with those awful fangs, and I straining to maintain my grip and choke the life from it as I kept it from my throat. Slowly my arms gave to the unequal struggle, and inch by inch the burning eyes and gleaming tusks of my antagonist crept toward me, until, as the hairy face touched mine again, I realized that all was over. And then a living mass of destruction sprang from the surrounding darkness full upon the creature that held me pinioned to the ground. The two rolled growling upon the moss, tearing and rending one another in a frightful manner, but it was soon over and my preserver stood with lowered head above the throat of the dead thing which would have killed me.

  The nearer moon, hurtling suddenly above the horizon and lighting up the Barsoomian scene, showed me that my preserver was Woolan, but from whence she had come, or how found me, I was at a loss to know. That I was glad of her companionship it is needless to say, but my pleasure at seeing hers was tempered by anxiety as to the reason of her leaving Dejar Thoris. Only his death I felt sure, could account for her absence from him, so faithful I knew her to be to my commands.

  By the light of the now brilliant moons I saw that she was but a shadow of her former self, and as she turned from my caress and commenced greedily to devour the dead carcass at my feet I realized that the poor fellow was more than half starved. I, myself, was in but little better plight but I could not bring myself to eat the uncooked flesh and I had no means of making a fire. When Woolan had finished her meal I again took up my weary and seemingly endless wandering in quest of the elusive waterway.

  At daybreak of the fifteenth day of my search I was overjoyed to see the high trees that denoted the object of my search. About noon I dragged myself wearily to the portals of a huge building which covered perhaps four square miles and towered two hundred feet in the air. It showed no aperture in the mighty walls other than the tiny door at which I sank exhausted, nor was there any sign of life about it.

  I could find no bell or other method of making my presence known to the inmates of the place, unless a small round role in the wall near the door was for that purpose. It was of about the bigness of a lead pencil and thinking that it might be in the nature of a speaking tube I put my mouth to it and was about to call into it when a voice issued from it asking me whom I might be, where from, and the nature of my errand.

  I explained that I had escaped from the Warhoons and was dying of starvation and exhaustion.

  'You wear the metal of a green warrior and are followed by a calot, yet you are of the figure of a red woman. In color you are neither green nor red. In the name of the ninth day, what manner of creature are you?'

  'I am a friend of the red women of Barsoom and I am starving. In the name of humanity open to us,' I replied.

  Presently the door commenced to recede before me until it had sunk into the wall fifty feet, then it stopped and slid easily to the left, exposing a short, narrow corridor of concrete, at the further end of which was another door, similar in every respect to the one I had just passed. No one was in sight, yet immediately we passed the first door it slid gently into place behind us and receded rapidly to its original position in the front wall of the building. As the door had slipped aside I had noted its great thickness, fully twenty feet, and as it reached its place once more after closing behind us, great cylinders of steel had dropped from the ceiling behind it and fitted their lower ends into apertures countersunk in the floor.

  A second and third door receded before me and slipped to one side as the first, before I reached a large inner chamber where I found food and drink set out upon a great stone table. A voice directed me to satisfy my hunger and to feed my calot, and while I was thus engaged my invisible host put me through a severe and searching cross-examination.

  'Your statements are most remarkable,' said the voice, on concluding its questioning, 'but you are evidently speaking the truth, and it is equally evident that you are not of Barsoom. I can tell that by the conformation of your brain and the strange location of your internal organs and the shape and size of your heart.'

  'Can you see through me?' I exclaimed.

  'Yes, I can see all but your thoughts, and were you a Barsoomian I could read those.'

  Then a door opened at the far side of the chamber and a strange, dried up, little mummy of a woman came toward me. She wore but a single article of clothing or adornment, a small collar of gold from which depended upon her bosom a great ornament as large as a dinner plate set solid with huge diamonds, except for the exact center which was occupied by a strange stone, an inch in diameter, that scintillated nine different and distinct rays; the seven colors of our earthly prism and two beautiful rays which, to me, were new and nameless. I cannot describe them any more than you could describe red to a blind woman. I only know that they were beautiful in the extreme.

  The old woman sat and talked with me for hours, and the strangest part of our intercourse was that I could read her every thought while she could not fathom an iota from my mind unless I spoke.

  I did not apprise her of my ability to sense her mental operations, and thus I learned a great deal which proved of immense value to me later and which I would never have known had she suspected my strange power, for the Martians have such perfect control of their mental machinery that they are able to direct their thoughts with absolute precision.

  The building in which I found myself contained the machinery which produces that artificial atmosphere which sustains life on Mars. The secret of the entire process hinges on the use of the ninth ray, one of the beautiful scintillations which I had noted emanating from the great stone in my host's diadem.

  This ray is separated from the other rays of the sun by means of finely adjusted instruments placed upon the roof of the huge building, three-quarters of which is used for reservoirs in which the ninth ray is stored. This product is then treated electrically, or rather certain proportions of refined electric vibrations are incorporated with it, and the result is then pumped to the five principal air centers of the planet where, as it is released, contact with the ether of space transforms it into atmosphere.

  There is always sufficient reserve of the ninth ray stored in the great building to maintain the present Martian atmosphere for a thousand years, and the only fear, as my new friend told me, was that some accident might befall the pumping apparatus.

  She led me to an inner chamber where I beheld a battery of twenty radium pumps any one of which was equal to the task of furnishing all Mars with the atmosphere compound. For eight hundred years, she told me, she had watched these pumps which are used alternately a day each at a stretch, or a little over twenty-four and one-half Earth hours. She has one assistant who divides the watch with her. Half a Martian year, about three hundred and forty-four of our days, each of these women spend alone in this huge, isolated
plant.

  Every red Martian is taught during earliest childhood the principles of the manufacture of atmosphere, but only two at one time ever hold the secret of ingress to the great building, which, built as it is with walls a hundred and fifty feet thick, is absolutely unassailable, even the roof being guarded from assault by air craft by a glass covering five feet thick.

  The only fear they entertain of attack is from the green Martians or some demented red woman, as all Barsoomians realize that the very existence of every form of life of Mars is dependent upon the uninterrupted working of this plant.

  One curious fact I discovered as I watched her thoughts was that the outer doors are manipulated by telepathic means. The locks are so finely adjusted that the doors are released by the action of a certain combination of thought waves. To experiment with my new-found toy I thought to surprise her into revealing this combination and so I asked her in a casual manner how she had managed to unlock the massive doors for me from the inner chambers of the building. As quick as a flash there leaped to her mind nine Martian sounds, but as quickly faded as she answered that this was a secret she must not divulge.

  From then on her manner toward me changed as though she feared that she had been surprised into divulging her great secret, and I read suspicion and fear in her looks and thoughts, though her words were still fair.

  Before I retired for the night she promised to give me a letter to a nearby agricultural officer who would help me on my way to Zodanga, which she said, was the nearest Martian city.

  'But be sure that you do not let them know you are bound for Helium as they are at war with that country. My assistant and I are of no country, we belong to all Barsoom and this talisman which we wear protects us in all lands, even among the green men--though we do not trust ourselves to their hands if we can avoid it,' she added.

  'And so good-night, my friend,' she continued, 'may you have a long and restful sleep--yes, a long sleep.'

  And though she smiled pleasantly I saw in her thoughts the wish that she had never admitted me, and then a picture of her standing over me in the night, and the swift thrust of a long dagger and the half formed words, 'I am sorry, but it is for the best good of Barsoom.'

  As she closed the door of my chamber behind her her thoughts were cut off from me as was the sight of her, which seemed strange to me in my little knowledge of thought transference.

  What was I to do? How could I escape through these mighty walls? Easily could I kill her now that I was warned, but once she was dead I could no more escape, and with the stopping of the machinery of the great plant I should die with all the other inhabitants of the planet--all, even Dejar Thoris were he not already dead. For the others I did not give the snap of my finger, but the thought of Dejar Thoris drove from my mind all desire to kill my mistaken host.

  Cautiously I opened the door of my apartment and, followed by Woolan, sought the inner of the great doors. A wild scheme had come to me; I would attempt to force the great locks by the nine thought waves I had read in my host's mind.

  Creeping stealthily through corridor after corridor and down winding runways which turned hither and thither I finally reached the great hall in which I had broken my long fast that morning. Nowhere had I seen my host, nor did I know where she kept herself by night.

  I was on the point of stepping boldly out into the room when a slight noise behind me warned me back into the shadows of a recess in the corridor. Dragging Woolan after me I crouched low in the darkness.

  Presently the old woman passed close by me, and as she entered the dimly lighted chamber which I had been about to pass through I saw that she held a long thin dagger in her hand and that she was sharpening it upon a stone. In her mind was the decision to inspect the radium pumps, which would take about thirty minutes, and then return to my bed chamber and finish me.

  As she passed through the great hall and disappeared down the runway which led to the pump-room, I stole stealthily from my hiding place and crossed to the great door, the inner of the three which stood between me and liberty.

  Concentrating my mind upon the massive lock I hurled the nine thought waves against it. In breathless expectancy I waited, when finally the great door moved softly toward me and slid quietly to one side. One after the other the remaining mighty portals opened at my command and Woolan and I stepped forth into the darkness, free, but little better off than we had been before, other than that we had full stomachs.

  Hastening away from the shadows of the formidable pile I made for the first crossroad, intending to strike the central turnpike as quickly as possible. This I reached about morning and entering the first enclosure I came to I searched for some evidences of a habitation.

  There were low rambling buildings of concrete barred with heavy impassable doors, and no amount of hammering and hallooing brought any response. Weary and exhausted from sleeplessness I threw myself upon the ground commanding Woolan to stand guard.

  Some time later I was awakened by her frightful growlings and opened my eyes to see three red Martians standing a short distance from us and covering me with their rifles.

  'I am unarmed and no enemy,' I hastened to explain. 'I have been a prisoner among the green women and am on my way to Zodanga. All I ask is food and rest for myself and my calot and the proper directions for reaching my destination.'

  They lowered their rifles and advanced pleasantly toward me placing their right hands upon my left shoulder, after the manner of their custom of salute, and asking me many questions about myself and my wanderings. They then took me to the house of one of them which was only a short distance away.

  The buildings I had been hammering at in the early morning were occupied only by stock and farm produce, the house proper standing among a grove of enormous trees, and, like all red-Martian homes, had been raised at night some forty or fifty feet from the ground on a large round metal shaft which slid up or down within a sleeve sunk in the ground, and was operated by a tiny radium engine in the entrance hall of the building. Instead of bothering with bolts and bars for their dwellings, the red Martians simply run them up out of harm's way during the night. They also have private means for lowering or raising them from the ground without if they wish to go away and leave them.

  These sisters, with their husbands and children, occupied three similar houses on this farm. They did no work themselves, being government officers in charge. The labor was performed by convicts, prisoners of war, delinquent debtors and confirmed bachelors who were too poor to pay the high celibate tax which all red-Martian governments impose.

  They were the personification of cordiality and hospitality and I spent several days with them, resting and recuperating from my long and arduous experiences.

  When they had heard my story--I omitted all reference to Dejar Thoris and the old woman of the atmosphere plant--they advised me to color my body to more nearly resemble their own race and then attempt to find employment in Zodanga, either in the army or the navy.

  'The chances are small that your tale will be believed until after you have proven your trustworthiness and won friends among the higher nobles of the court. This you can most easily do through military service, as we are a warlike people on Barsoom,' explained one of them, 'and save our richest favors for the fighting woman.'

  When I was ready to depart they furnished me with a small domestic bull thoat, such as is used for saddle purposes by all red Martians. The animal is about the size of a horse and quite gentle, but in color and shape an exact replica of her huge and fierce cousin of the wilds.

  The sisters had supplied me with a reddish oil with which I anointed my entire body and one of them cut my hair, which had grown quite long, in the prevailing fashion of the time, square at the back and banged in front, so that I could have passed anywhere upon Barsoom as a full-fledged red Martian. My metal and ornaments were also renewed in the style of a Zodangan gentlewoman, attached to the house of Ptor, which was the family name of my benefactors.

  They filled
a little sack at my side with Zodangan money. The medium of exchange upon Mars is not dissimilar from our own except that the coins are oval. Paper money is issued by individuals as they require it and redeemed twice yearly. If a woman issues more than she can redeem, the government pays her creditors in full and the debtor works out the amount upon the farms or in mines, which are all owned by the government. This suits everybody except the debtor as it has been a difficult thing to obtain sufficient voluntary labor to work the great isolated farm lands of Mars, stretching as they do like narrow ribbons from pole to pole, through wild stretches peopled by wild animals and wilder women.

  When I mentioned my inability to repay them for their kindness to me they assured me that I would have ample opportunity if I lived long upon Barsoom, and bidding me farewell they watched me until I was out of sight upon the broad white turnpike.