Loot of the Void
Page 5
into the yawning gorge his bodyhurtled, the sound of his frenzied, dwindling screams floating upeerily out of the black, ominous depths.
Penrun crouched against the wall, sick and trembling. Irma, Helgers!He must hurry! He fumbled again for the pistols. They were gone.Crawling forward now, still shaken by his narrow escape from death, hegained the pathway. The rain was drumming wildly on the barren granitenow, and the pitch-blackness was shattered only by ghastly lightningbolts.
Guided by the flashes, he clambered up the slope and halted abruptly.The door of the space-sphere was open, and, silhouetted against thesoft glow of light within it, was Irma, seated dejectedly with bowedhead, heedless of the cold rain beating down upon her. Helgers wasnowhere to be seen. Penrun dashed forward.
"Irma, Irma!" he cried. "What has happened? Where is he?"
She raised her head slowly and stared at him as at one risen from thedead. Then she burst into tears.
"He said they had killed you--had thrown your body into the gorge,"she sobbed. "I--I just didn't want to live after that. Are you hurt?"
"Not a bit," he assured her fervently. "But where is Helgers?"
"I pistoled him," she said quietly. "I had no choice. He came at meafter I warned him to keep away. He fell over there among the rocks.Oh, Dick, let us hurry away from this mad place!"
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He stared at the rain-swept rocks. The heavy metal treasure chest laya few yards away where Helgers had dropped it. Penrun moved cautiouslytoward the spot where he had fallen. He was gone. The rain had washedaway any traces of blood that might have remained.
While Penrun hesitated, the roar of the tempest was split by a man'sscream of agony. A lurid flash of lightning an instant later revealeda gigantic spider down by the cataract with Helgers' struggling bodyin his mandible jaws. Returning blackness blotted out the scene.
Irma's pistol stabbed a ray through the driving rain at the hideousmonster. Instantly its grating roar for help rang out, and a group ofred lights from the doomed _Osprey_ across the plateau, detachedthemselves from the others and came streaking for the cataract.
Penrun seized the heavy treasure chest and staggered to the sphere.
"Hurry, here they come!" screamed the girl.
He fell through the door with his burden just as the foremost monsterleaped the river. The next instant Irma sent the sphere rocketingupward. Just before they plunged into the clouds they caught a lastglimpse of the _Osprey_ with her ray guns melted off by the redcylinder torches, and great holes gaping in her sides through whichthe monsters were carrying out the members of the crew to their cavernof the Living Dead.
As the sphere burst through the storm cloud into the frigid air aboveit, Irma gave a cry and pointed at the peak where they had hidden inthe sphere. The peak was now alive with moving red lights of monsterssearching vainly for them. The scene dropped swiftly below as thesphere gathered speed for its homeward journey.
"We got only a small portion of the treasure, but it will be enough,"said Penrun. "After we pay your family's debt, I want to spend ahundred thousand or so for a specially chartered battle-sphere whichwill come back here to Titan. If the Interplanetary Council will donothing about the Trap-Door City, I shall, independently. Not rays,but good old primitive bombs such as they used back in the TwentiethCentury. I'll blow the hellish place off the face of the map and withit the cavern of the Living Dead. I think those lying in the hammockswould thank me for releasing them in that way."
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