CHAPTER 14
UP THE STAIR
When we entered the broad clearing of the plaza, we found it almost entirely deserted. Above us loomed the winding, spiral stair, and where that stair touched the pit's floor, we saw the blaze of ruddy light that illuminated the high, barred gate of the stair. Keeping well within the shadows, we passed toward the farther edge of the plaza, and in the darkness there, Lantin and I took up our position directly beneath the lowest curve of the spiral stairway, which hung in the air some thirty feet above our heads. Even where we stood, we could hear the tramp of feet around the stair's curve, as guards came and went, constantly patrolling the lower part of the airy pathway. And, too, we heard the chatter and broken laughter of the other guards massed inside the gate.
Speaking in whispers, Denham said, "Be ready to make your attempt at any moment now. But be sure that all the guards on the stair have come down to the gateway before you try it."
"If we get out and come back with aid," I said, rapidly, "where will we find you?"
He reflected for a moment, then said, "You know that tall barracks building at the northern edge of the pit, right under the wall?"
"The one that is roofed?" I asked, and he nodded. "Yes, that's the one. Well, we four will spend all our nights on that roof from now on. You could come straight down the shaft, in your flying-car, and pick us up from that roof in the darkness without the knowledge of any here in the pit. But first, go and get aid from the people of Kom, as we planned."
"And Cannell?" said Lantin. "You will look for him?"
"Never fear," answered D'Alord, "we'll find him for you."
The calm voice of Fabrius broke into our speech. "It is time to do our part at the gate," he said to Denham, and the Englishman nodded. "Good-bye," he told us. "I know you'll do your best." A warm hand-clasp from each, and then they had slipped away into the shadows.
For a minute or so, Lantin and I stood silent, listening to the tramp of feet on the stair above us, and then a sudden high-pitched cry broke on our ears from the center of the plaza. It was D'Alord's voice, and he was shouting at the top of his lungs, "Out, comrades, out! We are to be loosed on Kom tonight!"
The cry rang out over the silent city, and then was repeated, but louder, the Frenchman's three friends adding their voices to his. There was an uneasy murmur from the guards at the gate, and one among them called to the Frenchman, whom they could not see in the darkness, to cease his shouting.
He went on with the cry, unheeding, and now, out of the buildings along the branching streets, men were pouring, running toward the plaza. They heard D'Alord's cry and took it up, thinking that his statement was a true one, and repeating it.
"Loose us on Kom tonight!" they bellowed, rushing toward the gate of the stair and pressing against it. Away across the great clearing, we saw a sea of faces around the ruddy lighted gate, pressing against it and against the high wall that balustraded the stair's length for the first few yards. And from all around, from all of the nine branching streets, came others, sword in hand, afire to be led out to loot the city whose riches had been many times described to them.
They beat against the barred gate in one buffeting wave of solid humanity, in eager hope of freedom and pillage. Their cry rose up like that of a single, vast voice, but in a thousand different tongues.
"Loose us tonight! Loose us on Kom tonight!"
There were anxious cries from the guards on the stair as the great mob battered at the gate. Those of the guards who patrolled the stair's upper part ran down swiftly to aid their fellows in holding the gate. It was this that Lantin and I awaited, and at once I grasped the metal grappling-hook, whirled it round my head by the attached rope, and then sent it hurtling through the air toward the edge of the stair above us.
It struck the outside of the stair's low wall with a loud clang that brought my heart to my throat, and that I feared would attract the attention of the guards at the gate, even over the clamor of the crowd. But the hook had not caught and fell down beside me.
Before I could throw it again there was a warning whisper from Lantin, and in a moment a solid group of some fifty men rushed by us, heading toward the riot at the gate, news of which had evidently penetrated to the city's farthest reaches. They raced by, not seeing us in the darkness, and after them came four or five single stragglers who likewise passed us without stopping. Then, the coast again being clear for the moment, I slung up the hook again, with more force than before, and felt a throb of relief when it caught, slid a little along the edge of the stair-wall, and then caught again.
I tried the rope hastily, but it held firm, so I hastily began to climb up it, by means of the thick knots along its length. Scrambling up with panicky swiftness, I reached the rail, pulled myself over, and lay gasping for a moment on the stair. Then, leaning over the rail, I signaled to Lantin, whom I could see but dimly in the darkness. Bracing myself against the wall of the stair, I pulled in the rope until after a seeming eternity my friend's head appeared above the wall. He scrambled over, and then, winding the rope around my body and tossing the hook as far away as possible, I stood for a moment motionless.
Across the plaza, and below us, was the gate, flooded with crimson light and alive with activity. The mobs of the city's dwellers were pressing against the gate, while the guards were repelling them by thrusting through the bars with their long spears. And from all the long streets that stretched away into the darkness there came the sound of many running feet, and the cries of excited men. Certainly the riot which our friends had kindled to aid us was no mean one.
A moment only I watched the scene below, then turned, and with Lantin beside me, began the long climb up the spiral stair.
As we toiled up along the steeply slanting spiral, the clamor at the gates below gradually lessened in volume as we drew away from it. That the riot below had not yet been quelled, though, was evident, for before we had been on the stair ten minutes, a tiny beam of blue light flashed out at the gate, a narrow little shaft of azure light that clove up to the shaft above us, and seemed to stab straight up to the metal cover of that shaft.
I remembered Denham's words concerning the signaling of the guards, and wondered if that was the cause of the little light. In a minute it vanished, but as we raced on up around the great spiral, a faint sound came down to us from far above, a grating clash of metal that we could barely hear.
"The temple floor!" I cried to Lantin. "They've swung it aside! They've uncovered the shaft of the stairway!"
He did not answer, out of breath from the toilsome climb. Before many more minutes had passed, we had progressed half-way from the floor of the cavern to its roof, up the stair. Abruptly something hissed down from above through the circle of the spiral stair. The hissing was repeated, and now I saw that it had been caused by a number of thick ropes that had been dropped from above, and that now swung free at the center of the stairway's spiral.
I grasped Lantin, flung myself flat on the stair, pulling him down with me. And not a moment too soon, for peering cautiously over the low wall, I saw dark shapes flashing down along those swinging cables, in long strings, one after another. When they had passed, we jumped to our feet and sped on.
"The guards from above," I told my companion. "Let's hope that all above have gone down."
On we raced, around and around the spiral, ever upward. The sound of the riot in the pit had faded from our ears by now, and we came to the roof of the cavern, and the shaft that pierced it. On we went, the wall of the shaft on our left side now, and we hugged that wall closely as we sped up the narrow pathway.
I judged that we had traversed two-thirds of the stair's length, when Lantin suddenly halted. When I turned, he held up a warning hand, listening intently.
"Hear it?" he asked, in a low voice.
I listened tensely, and in a moment heard the sound that had halted him. It was a rhythmic, regular thudding, and seemed to come from a point some distance above us, and across the shaft from us.
"The guards!" he whispered. "Some of them are coming down the stair!"
All the blood drove from my heart at the thought, for we were caught on the airy stairway without chance to advance or retreat. And every minute that I stood there in indecision, the tramping feet of the guards were nearing me. Why they were descending by the stair instead of the ropes, I could not guess, though it may have been that they had already started down the stair before the alarm from below. But whatever the reason, they were coming nearer and nearer, until finally they were directly across the shaft, coming around the down-slanting curve of the stairway toward us.
My brain, momentarily stupefied by the oncoming deadly peril, again acted, and with frantic speed I unrolled the rope that was wound round my body. The low wall that protected the stair's right side was pierced at regular intervals with circular, ornamental openings, and swiftly I passed the rope through one of these and tied it securely, then tied its other end into a double loop. At once Lantin saw my purpose, and with a muttered "Good!" he set his foot in one of the loops, while I did the same with the other.
Swiftly the tramping feet were coming around the curve toward us, though in the murky darkness of the shaft we could make out nothing. Feet in the loops at the rope's end, we grasped the low wall of the stair and gently swung ourselves over it. Then, hanging above the abyss, we lowered ourselves until we swung some twenty feet below the stair, floating gently back and forth at the rope's end, with nearly two miles of space below us.
The marching guards came quickly around the stair's curve, and I held my breath as they passed the place where our rope was tied. If one but felt it and slashed carelessly with a knife, we would hurtle down to death on the floor of the pit, far below. But the guards passed on, and I could plainly hear the command of their leader to move faster, as they went by us.
Waiting until they had progressed to the opposite side of the shaft, Lantin and I began to pull ourselves up. Slowly, toilsomely, we fought our way upward until our hands gripped the stair's rail and we were able to scramble over it onto the steps.
As I rolled over the wall onto those steps, the hilt of my rapier struck the metal stairway with a loud jar. Appalled, I lay tense for minutes, but there was no sound to indicate the guards had heard, and we could hear their marching footsteps dying away below.
I rose to my feet, then, breathing hard. "A near shave, that," I told Lantin, who was also struggling to regain his breath. "If those guards had caught us on the stair, it would have been all up with us." Untying the rope from the wall, I again wound it round my body, and stepped up to where Lantin awaited me.
He was looking back the way we had come, peering into the darkness. As I stepped up toward him he cried suddenly, "Look out, Wheeler!" and as I instinctively threw myself flat on the stairway, a heavy knife hurtled out of the air behind me and passed over me, striking the wall. I jumped to my feet and turned, ripping out my sword.
Five steps down the stair from us a guard was standing, a tall, dark-faced fellow whom I could just see in the nightmare blackness of the shaft. In a flash, I knew that the clang of my rapier on the stairway had been heard, by this fellow at least, and that he had come back to investigate and had found us.
The man below me uttered a hoarse cry, and ran straight up toward me, his long spear aimed at my heart. But by now my own rapier was out, and avoiding the spear by a quick sidestep, I thrust with my blade at his throat, where no armor protected him. The stab was a true one, and he sank to the stair with a choking, terrible cry that rang out eerily there in the vast dark shaft. From far below his cry was answered. There was no time to lose, and we pressed on up the stair.
But now there were cries from below, and a bugle peal came up toward us. It was evident that the alarm had been sounded by the cry of the guard I had killed, and that we were being pursued.
I knew that we were very near to the stair's top, by then, but although we knew the metal cover of the shaft was not in place, there was no light from the great opening above us, the great temple being as dark as the shaft below it.
"Pray God there are no guards at the top of the stair," I cried to Lantin, as we sped upward. He did not answer, and from his agonized breathing I knew that he was out of wind from our long, torturing climb. And, away across the shaft now, there was a chorus of shouts as the guards beneath raced after us. Their cries halted for a moment, and by this I knew that they had found the body of the man I had killed. Then, with yelps of rage, they sped on after us.
We staggered drunkenly up the last curve of the stair. Out of the darkness appeared the little collapsible stairway which joined the temple's black ring of flooring with the great spiral on which we stood. There was no sign of the presence of any guards around or above it, so I jerked out the sword at my belt, and clasping it in one hand, strode cautiously up the little stair until I stood on the black flooring that was the rim of the shaft up which we had come.
Dense darkness reigned in the gigantic building, and the complete silence in it showed me that it was deserted. Lantin was beside me now, and the cries of the pursuing guards were ringing up the shaft ever louder, as they neared us. I sprang to the building's wall, clawing frantically along its side.
Abruptly my hands encountered the thick lever I was searching for, and as I jerked it down as far as it would go, I sobbed with relief. There was a loud click, and the little collapsible stair swung up and folded into an aperture in the wall.
"That will hold them on the stair, for a time," I told my friend, who had come up to me and was grasping my arm. As we raced around the wall to the building's entrance and exit, I explained in a few words what I had done. It was well for us, too, that I had remembered how the little stair was folded and unfolded, for as we sped down the tunneled gateway to the outside air, there came a shout of baffled rage from behind us, as the guards on the stair found their progress thus stopped.
Speeding down the arched tunnel through the temple's great wall, we emerged at last into the open air. For a moment, heedless of the clamor in the temple behind us, we stood with swelling hearts, breathing in the free air, expanding, almost, there beneath the limitless sky, after our sojourn in the cramped cavern below.
Darkness reigned over the city of the Kanlars, a darkness intensified by the absence of moon or stars above. From where we stood, the broad street, plashed with ruddy light from the glowing bulbs along its length, stretched away to the east, piercing the mass of winking lights that betokened the city's presence. Even from where we stood, we could see that there were many of the guards in the street, and there was no chance of our passing them unchallenged.
I turned to Lantin, but before I could speak we both shrank back into the temple's entrance. Footsteps were sounding on the ground near us, coming toward us along the outside of the temple's wall!
We crouched against the wall of the tunneled entrance, hearing the footsteps come nearer. From the temple behind us came the faint, raging clamor of the guards on the stair, who were still blocked by my stratagem. Then two figures appeared in the entrance of the tunnel, two ghostly white figures who were advancing through the darkness.
"Slaves!" muttered Lantin, and from the white robes and stiff movements, I saw that he had guessed the identity of the two aright. They walked on toward us, then passed us, at arm's length, walking stiffly, mechanically, past us. Whether or not they saw us, I can not say, though if they had glimpsed us, I doubt whether their soulless natures would have understood the significance of our presence there. At any rate, they passed us by, and proceeded on down the tunnel.
My sword was in my hand, and grasping it by the blade six inches or more beneath the hilt, I stole quickly down the tunnel after the white-robed figures. As quietly as possible, I hastened after them, and in a moment the heavy hilt of my rapier swung down on their skulls in two swift blows, and they slumped to the floor. A low call brought Lantin to my side, and we hastily pulled the long white robes from the two on the floor, and put them on over our own clothing. I shuddered with deep loathing, in the process, for these two men on the floor were icy-cold to the touch. Dead-alive, and slaves to the Kanlars! I hoped, at least, that my blows had released them from their dreadful servitude.
Disguised now by the white garments, we hastened again out of the tunnel and down the broad ramp into the red-lit street. We passed some distance along that street before we came near to any of the guards, and when we did so, we changed our pace, walking stiffly and rigidly, eyes staring straight ahead, striving to give to our faces the blank, deathly expression of the faces of the slaves.
We were unchallenged, the guards passing us without giving us more than a casual glance. And as we passed group after group of the armored men, we began to breathe easier, though we still kept to our unlifelike walk and expression.
As we drew farther toward the city's edge, the street became more deserted. The buildings began to lessen in size and frequency, and we were not far from the spot where the red lights along the street ended and it became a road.
Abruptly, I clutched Lantin's arm. From far behind us, from the temple whence we had fled, there rose a great ringing sound, a vast bell-note that echoed out over all the city clearly. It was repeated, and now, from far behind us also, came a dim, angry clamor, a score or more of raging shouts, through which there cut the clear note of a bugle.
"The guards!" I whispered to Lantin, tensely. "Someone has found them there on the stair! They're after us!"
"Faster," he muttered to me, without turning. "We're almost out of the city."
It was so, in truth, for we were nearing the end of the street's lighted part, while on each side the buildings were becoming fewer. We had met no one on the street for the last few minutes, and as we passed under the last of the glowing bulbs, I turned and cried to my friend, "Out of the city, Lantin!"
He caught his breath, turned to me, his face livid, and whispered, "For God's sake, Wheeler, be still! That guard over there is watching us!"
My heart contracted suddenly, as I looked toward the left of the street and saw the man he referred to, a guard in full armor who stood at the doorway of a small building and regarded us suspiciously. No doubt his attention had been aroused by the spectacle of one slave talking to another, and I cursed my folly in crying out to Lantin.
We passed on, hearts thumping, into the darkness that lay beyond the lane of crimson light. Once safe within it, we swiftly shed the white robes, whose length hampered our movements, and then set out along the road at a rapid trot.
Away back in the city, the disturbed, angry clamor of our pursuers lessened, faded. We were in open country now, and as the road soon ended, we fled on over the long, grassy swells toward the east, toward the hills and the valley where our time-car was hidden.
"Safe!" I exulted, as we stumbled on through the thick darkness. "They'll never even know what direction we took."
"They will if the guard who saw us talking tells them what he saw," replied Lantin, and I sobered.
"Even then—" I began, but broke off suddenly, and looked back. "Lantin!" I shouted. "Lantin!"
Out of the city toward us were streaming a hundred or more men, carrying with them on long poles many of the flashing red light-giving bulbs, whose crimson rays struck down and glinted on the armor and spear-points of the men who carried them. Over a mile behind, yet the gap between us was fast decreasing as they came straight on toward us.
"The grass!" I gasped, as we stumbled on; "they can track us easily by it!"
The grass over which we ran was high and seemingly very dry and brittle, so that at every step we crushed down great masses of it into a trail that a child could have followed. And a great, wolflike shouting came from behind, as our pursuers struck our track.
On we ran, lungs laboring and hearts near to bursting, but steadily the guards behind us drew nearer until they were within a half-mile of us. By that time, we knew that we must be drawing near to the valley where our car was concealed, and then it was that our real race began.
I heard Lantin's breath coming in great sobs, and knew that he was almost winded. The long climb up the stair from the pit and the flight through the city had sapped his strength, and his endurance was near its breaking point.
Through the darkness, a darker mass loomed up, and as we sped toward it, it showed itself to us as the little wood that lay across the valley's mouth. More by blind chance than by design, I think, we had come straight toward our objective, and now we struggled through the thicket with frantic bursts of speed.
We emerged from the wood into the open valley, and as we did so, Lantin sank to the ground.
"Go on, Wheeler," he gasped. "You can get to the car and get away. I can't go farther."
I looked back, and saw that our pursuers were advancing in a broad line through the wood, carrying forward a chain of the ruddy lights so that we might not hide from them in the shadows. There was no grass beneath the trees, and they could not track us in that way, but came on swiftly, for all that, shouting to each other mirthfully.
"I can't leave you here," I told Lantin. "If you stay, I stay."
"Go on!" he ordered. "You can make it, without me. Hurry!"
I glanced back, hesitated a moment, then swiftly stooped and swung an arm under Lantin's shoulders, half lifting him to his feet. Then, half dragging, half carrying him, I toiled up the valley toward our hidden car.
I did not look back, but long rays of red light stabbed past me as our pursuers and their lights emerged from the wood. By that crimson glare they saw me, for a savage cry went up. A few strides and I was at the spot on the valley's bottom, on the slope above which lay the time-car. With fast-waning strength, I started up that slope.
Down the valley toward me bounded a score of men, spears and swords gleaming in the light of the bulb-torches behind them. Dragging Lantin on, blind with sweat and every muscle straining to its utmost power, I toiled up the slope, more like a goaded, maddened beast than a human being, while Lantin still besought me to drop him and save myself.
And up the slope after me raced the shouting guards, a hundred yards behind and gaining every second. I burst through the screen of boughs around our car, and sobbed with relief to see that it was still there, untouched. I spun open the circular door in its top, and dropped Lantin inside. I had just placed my feet inside the opening, when a dozen of the armored guards burst through the screen of branches, their red bulb-torches illuminating the little clearing with crimson light.
They stopped short on seeing me, some fifteen feet away. The three nearest me raised their right arms above their heads, a heavy spear poised in each. Then, like leaping metal serpents, the three heavy, dagger-pointed weapons flashed through the air toward me.
But in that split-second there came the click of a switch from the interior of the car, a gust of sudden wind smote me, and then the guards, torches, and even the three spears in midair had vanished, and the car, Lantin and I were speeding on into time.