CHAPTER XXXVII
THE FINAL STRUGGLE
Kamrou flung off his long and heavy cloak. He stood there inthe flamelight, broad-chested, beautifully muscled, lean of hip, theperfect picture of a fighting man. Naked he was, save for hisloin-cloth. And still he smiled.
Stern likewise stripped away his own cloak. Clad only like the chief,he faced him.
"Well, now," said he, "here goes! And may the best man win!"
Kamrou waved the circle back at one side. It opened, revealing thegreat pit to southward of the flame. Stern saw the vapors rising,bluish in that strange light, from the perpetual boiling of the blackwaters in its depths. Oddly enough, even at that moment a stray bit ofscientific thought nicked into his consciousness--the memory thatunder compressed air water boils only at very high temperatures. Downhere, in this great pressure, the water must easily be over threehundred degrees to seethe like that.
He, too, smiled.
"So much the better," thought he. "The hotter, the sooner it's allover for the man who goes!"
Up rose numbers of the two-pronged torches. Stern got confusedglimpses of the Folk--he saw the terrible, barbaric eagerness withwhich they now anticipated this inevitable tragedy of at least onehuman death in its most awful form.
Beatrice he no longer saw. Where was she? He knew not. But in a long,last cry of farewell he raised his voice. Then, with Kamrou, he strodetoward the steaming, boiling pit in the smooth rock floor.
Two tall men broke through the tensely eager throng. In their handsthey bore each a golden jar, curiously shaped and chiseled, andbearing a whimsical resemblance to a coffee-urn.
"What the devil now?" wondered Stern, eager to be at work. He saw atonce the meaning of the jars. One of the bearers approached Kamrou.The other came to him. They raised the vessels, and over theantagonists' bare bodies poured a thin, warm stream of somerank-smelling oil. All over the skin they rubbed it, till the bodiesglistened strangely in the flamelight. Then, with muttered words hecould not catch, they withdrew.
All seemed confused and vague to Stern as in a painful dream. Imagesand pictures seemed to present themselves to his brain. The light, thefog and heat, the rising stream, the roaring of the flame, and overall the throb-throb-throb of those infernal copper drums workedpowerfully on his senses.
Already he seemed to feel the grip of Kamrou, the pangs of the hardstruggle, the sudden plunge into the vat of scalding death.
With a strong effort he flung off these fancies and faced his sneeringfoe, who now--his red-wealed face puckered into a maliciousgrin--stood waiting.
Stern all at once saw the patriarch once more.
"Go, son!" cried the old man. "Now is the moment! When the drumscease, lay hold of him!"
Even as he spoke, the great drums slowed their beat, then stopped.
Stern, with a final thought of Beatrice, advanced.
All the advantage lay with Kamrou. Familiar with the place was he, andwith the rules of this incredible contest. Everywhere about him stoodcrowding hundreds of his Foll; owing him their allegiance, hostile tothe newcomer, the man from another world. Out of all that multitudeonly two hearts' beat in sympathy and hope for him; only two humanbeings gave him their thoughts and their support--a helpless girl; afeeble, blind old man.
Kamrou stood taller, too, than Stern, and certainly bulked heavier. Hewas in perfect condition, while Stern had not yet fully recovered fromthe fight in the Abyss, from the great change in living conditionsthere in the depths, and--more important still--from the harsh blow ofthe rock that had numbed his elbow on the beach.
His arms and hands, too, still felt the cramping of the cords that hadbound him. He needed a few hours yet to work them into suppleness andperfect strength. But respite there was none.
He must fight now at once under all handicaps, or die--and in hisdeath yield Beatrice to the barbaric passions of the chief.
Oddly enough there recurred to his mind, as he drew near the waiting,sneering Kamrou, that brave old war-cry of the Greeks of Xenophon asthey hurled themselves against the vastly greater army of thePersians--"Zeus Sotor kai Nike!--Zeus Savior and victory!"
The shout burst from his lips. Forward he ran, on to the battle whereeither he or the barbarian must perish in the boiling pit--forward,_to what? To victory--to death?_
Kamrou stood fast till Stern's right hand had almost gripped histhroat--for Stern, the challenger, had to deliver the first attack.
But suddenly he slipped aside; and as Stern swerved for him, made aquick leap.
With an agility, a strength and skill tiger-like and marvelous, hecaught Stern round the waist, whirled him and would have dashed himtoward the pit. But already the engineer's right arm was underKamrou's left; the right hand had him by the throat, and Kamrou's headwent sharply back till the vertebrae strained hard.
Eel-like, elusive, oiled, the chief broke the hold, even as he flung aleg about one of Stern's.
A moment they swayed, tugging, straining, panting. In the old daysStern would not for one moment have been a match for this barbaricathlete, but the long months of life close to nature had hardened himand toughened every fiber. And now a stab of joy thrilled through himas he realized that in his muscles lay at least a force to balk thesavage for a little while.
To Stern came back his wrestling lore of the very long ago, the daysof Harvard, in the dim, vanished past. He freed his left arm from thegorilla-like grip of Kamrou, and, quick as lightning, got ajiu-jitsu stranglehold.
The savage choked, gurgled, writhed; his face grew purple withstagnant blood. Then he leaped, dragging the engineer with him; theyfell, rolled, twisted--and Stern's hold was broken.
A great shout rose as Kamrou struggled up and once more seized theAmerican. He raised him like a child, and took a step, two, three,toward the infernal caldron in the rock floor.
Stern, desperate, wrenched his oiled arms clear. A second later theyhad closed again about the chief's throat--the one point of attackthat Stern had chosen for his best.
The barbarian faltered. Grunting, panting, he shook the engineer as adog shakes a rat, but the hold was secure. Kamrou's great arms wrappedthemselves in a formidable "body-scissors" grip; Stern felt the breathsqueezed from his body.
Then suddenly the chief's oily heel slipped on the smooth-worn rock,not ten feet from the lip of the bubbling vat--and for the second timeboth fell.
This time Stern was atop. Over they rolled, once, twice, strainingwith madness. Stern's thumbs were sunk deep in the throat of thebarbarian at either side. As he gouged harder, deeper, he felt theterrific pounding of the chief's jugular. Hot on his own neck pantedthe choking breath of Kamrou. Oh, could he only hold that grip aminute longer--even a half-minute!
But already his own breath was gone. A buzzing filled his ears;sparkling lights danced, quivering before his eyes. The blood seemedbursting his brain; far off and vague he heard the droning of theflame, the shouts and cries of the great horde of watchers.
A whiff of steam--hot, damp, terrifying--passed across his face, inwhich the veins were starting from the oily skin. His eyes, halfclosed, bulged from the sockets. He knew the pit was very close now;dully he heard its steady bubbling.
"If I go--he goes, too!" the engineer swore to himself. "He'll neverhave--Beatrice--anyway!"
Over and over they rolled, their grips tight-locked as steel. NowKamrou was on top, now Stern. But the chief's muscles were stillstrong as ever; Stern's already had begun to weaken.
Strive as he might, he could not get another hold, nor could he throwanother ounce of power into that he already had. Up, up, slowly upslipped the chief's arms; Stern knew the savage meant to throttle him;and once those long, prehensile fingers reached his throat, good-by!
Then it seemed to him a voice, very far and small, was speaking tohim, coolly, impersonally, in a matter-of-fact way as thoughsuggesting an experiment.
Dazed as he was, he recognized that voice--it was the voice of Dr.Harbutt, who once had taught him many a wily trick upon th
e mat;Harbutt, dead and gone these thousand years or more.
"Why not try the satsu-da, Stern?" the voice was saying. "Excellent,at times."
Though Stern's face was black and swollen, eyes shut and mouth alltwisted awry in this titanic struggle with the ape-hold of the hugechief, yet the soul within him calmly smiled.
The satsu-da--yes, he remembered it now, strongest and best of allthe jiu-jitsu feats.
And, suddenly loosening his hands from the chief's throat, he clenchedhis right fist, hard as steel.
A second later the "killing-blow" had fallen on the barbarian's neck,just where the swelling protuberance behind the ear marked the vitalspot.
Terrible was the force of that blow, struck for his own life, for thehonor of Beatrice, the salvation of the world.
Kamrou gave a strange grunt. His head fell backward. Both eyes closed;the mouth lolled open and a glairy froth began to trickle down.
The frightful grip of the long, hairy arms relaxed. Exhausted, Sternfell prone right on the slippery edge of the boiling pit.
He felt a sudden scalding dash of water, steam and boiling spray; heheard a sudden splash, then a wild, barbarous, long-drawn howling ofthe massed Folk.
Lying there, spent, gasping, all but dead in the thick steam-drift ofthe vat, he opened his eyes.
Kamrou was nowhere to be seen.
Seemingly very distant, he heard the copper drums begin to beat oncemore with feverish haste.
A great, compelling lassitude enveloped him. He knew no more.
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