The tunnel in which I found myself and along which
Nah-ee-lah led me toward the city of Laythe was
remarkable in several particulars. It was largely of
natural origin, seemingly consisting of a series of caves
which may have been formed by bubbles in the cooling lava
of the original molten flow and which had later been connected
by man to form a continuous subterranean corridor.
The caves themselves were usually more or less spherical
in shape and the debris from the connecting passageways
had been utilized to fill the bottoms of them to the level
of the main floor of the passageway. The general trend
of the tunnel was upward from the point at which we had
entered it, and there was a constant draught of air rushing
along it in the same direction in which we were moving,
assuring me that it was undoubtedly well ventilated for
its full length. The walls and ceiling were coated with a
substance of which radium was evidently one of the ingredients,
since even after we had lost sight of the entrance
the passageway was well illuminated. We had been moving
along in silence for quite a little distance when I finally
addressed Nah-ee-lah.
“It must seem good,” I said, “to travel again this familiar
tunnel of your native city. I know how happy I
should be were I thus approaching my own birthplace.”
“I am glad to be returning to Laythe,” she said, “for
many reasons, but for one I am sorry, and as for this
passageway it is scarcely more familiar to me than to you,
since I have traversed it but once before in my life and
that when I was a little girl and came here with my father
and his court upon the occasion of his periodical inspection
of the passageway, which is now practically never used.”
“If you are not familiar with the tunnel,” I asked, “are
you sure that there is no danger of our going astray at
some fork or branch?”
“There is but the one passageway,” she replied, “which
leads from the crater to Laythe.”
“And how long is the tunnel?” I asked. “Will we soon
enter the city?”
“No,” she replied, “it is a great distance from the crater
to Laythe.”
We had covered some little distance at this time, possibly
five or six miles, and she had scarcely ceased speaking
when a turn in the passageway led us into a cave
of larger proportions than any through which we had previously
passed and from the opposite side of which two
passageways diverged.
“I thought there were no branches,” I remarked.
“I do not understand it,” she said. “There is no branch
from the tunnel of Laythe.”
“Could it be possible that we are in the wrong tunnel?”
I asked, “and that this does not lead to Laythe?”
“A moment before I should have been sure that we were
in the right tunnel,” she replied, “but now, Julian, I do
not know, for never had I heard of any branch of our own
tunnel.”
We had crossed the cave and were standing between the
openings of the two divergent passageways.
“Which one shall we take?” I asked, but again she
shook her head.
“I do not know,” she replied.
“Listen!” I cautioned her. “What was that?” For
I was sure that I had heard a sound issuing from one of
the tunnels.
We stood peering into an aperture which revealed about
a hundred yards of the passageway before an abrupt turn
hid the continuation of it from our view. We could hear
what now resolved itself into the faint sound of voices
approaching us along the corridor, and then quite suddenly
the figure of a man appeared around the corner of the
turn. Nah-ee-lah leaped to one side out of sight, drawing
me with her.
“A Kalkar!” she whispered. “Oh, Julian, if they find
us we are lost.”
“If there is only one of them I can take care of him,”
I said.
“There will be more than one,” she replied; “there will
be many.”
“Then, let us return the way we came and make our
way to the top of the crater’s rim before they discover us.
We can throw their hooked poles into the crater, including
the one which we use to ascend from the mouth of the tunnel,
thus effectually preventing any pursuit.”
“We cannot cross this room again to the tunnel upon
the opposite side without being apprehended,” she replied.
“Our only hope is in hiding in this other tunnel until they
have passed and trusting to chance that we meet no one
within it.”
“Come, then,” I said. “I dislike the idea of flying like
a scared rabbit, but neither would there be any great wisdom
in facing armed men without a single weapon of defense.”
Even as we had whispered thus briefly together, we found
the voices from the other tunnel had increased and I
thought that I noted a tone of excitement in them, though
the speakers were still too far away for us to understand
their words. We moved swiftly up the branch tunnel, Nah-ee-lah
in the lead, and after passing the first turn we both
felt comparatively safe, for Nah-ee-lah was sure that the
men who had interrupted our journey were a party of
hunters on their way to the outer world by means of the
crater through which we had entered the tunnel and that
they would not come up the branch in which we were hiding.
Thus believing, we halted after we were safely out of sight
and hearing of the large cave we had just left.
“That man was a Kalkar,” said Nah-ee-lah, “which
means that we are in the wrong tunnel and that we must
retrace our steps and continue our search for Laythe upon
the surface of the ground.” Her voice sounded tired and
listless, as though hope had suddenly deserted her brave
heart. We were standing shoulder to shoulder in the narrow
corridor and I could not resist the impulse to place
an arm about her and comfort her.
“Do not despair, Nah-ee-lah,” I begged her; “we are
no worse off than we have been and much better off than
before we escaped the Va-gas of Ga-va-go. Then do you
not recall that you mentioned one drawback to your return
to Laythe—that you might be as well off here as there?
What was the reason, Nah-ee-lah?”
“Ko-tah wants me in marriage,” she replied. “Ko-tah
is very powerful. He expects one day to be Jemadar of
Laythe. This he cannot be while I live unless he marries
me.”
“Do you wish to marry him?” I asked.
“No,” she said; “not now. Before—” she hesitated—“before
I left Laythe I did not care so very much; but
now I know that I cannot wed with Ko-tah.”
“And your father,” I continued, “what of him—will
he insist that you marry Ko-tah?”
“He cannot do otherwise,” replied Nah-ee-lah, “for Ko-tah
is very powerful. If my father refuses to permit me
to marry him Ko-tah may overthrow him, and when my
father is dead, should I still refuse to marry Ko-tah he
may slay me, also, and then become Jemadar easily, for
the blood of Jemadars flows in his veins.”
“It appears to me, Nah-ee-lah, that you will be about as
badly off at home as anywhere else in Va-nah. It is too
bad that I cannot take you to my own Earth, where you
would be quite safe, and I am sure, happy.”
“I wish that you might, Julian,” she replied simply.
I was about to reply when she placed slim fingers upon
my lips. “Hush, Julian!” she whispered, “they are following
us up this corridor. Come quickly, we must escape
before they overtake us,” and so saying, she turned and
ran quickly along the corridor which led neither of us
knew whither.
But we were soon to find out, for we had gone but a
short distance when we came to the tunnel’s end in a large
circular chamber, at one end of which was a rostrum upon
which were a massive, elaborately carved desk and a chair
of similar design. Below the rostrum were arranged other
chairs in rows, with a broad aisle down the center. The
furniture, though of peculiar design and elaborately carved
with strange figures of unearthly beasts and reptiles, was
not, for all of that, markedly dissimilar to articles of
the same purpose fabricated upon Earth. The chairs had
four legs, high backs and broad arms, seeming to have been
designed equally for durability, service, and comfort.
I glanced quickly around the apartment, as we first entered,
only taking in the details later, but I saw that there
was no other opening than the one through which we had
entered.
“We will have to wait here, Nah-ee-lah,” I said. “Perhaps,
though, all will be well—the Kalkars may prove
friendly.”
She shook her head negatively. “No,” she said, “they
will not be friendly.”
“What will they do to us?” I asked.
“They will make slaves of us,” she replied, “and we
shall spend the balance of our lives working almost continuously
until we drop with fatigue under the cruelest of
taskmakers, for the Kalkars hate us of Laythe and will
hesitate at nothing that will humiliate or injure us.”
She had scarcely ceased speaking when there appeared
in the entrance of the cave the figure of a man about my
own height dressed in a tunic similar to Nah-ee-lah’s but
evidently made of leather. He carried a knife slung in a
scabbard depending from a shoulder belt, and in his right
hand he grasped a slender lance. His eyes were close set
upon either side of a prominent, hooked nose. They were
watery, fishy, blue eyes, and the hair growing profusely
above his low forehead was flaxen in color. His physique
was admirable, except for a noticeable stoop. His feet
were very large and his gait awkward when he moved.
Behind him I could see the heads and shoulders of others.
They stood there grinning at us for a moment, most
malevolently, it seemed to me, and then they entered the
cave—a full dozen of them. There were several types,
with eyes and hair of different colors, the former ranging
from blue to brown, the latter from light blond to almost
black.
As they emerged from the mouth of the tunnel they
spread out and advanced slowly toward us. We were cornered
like rats in a trap. How I longed for the feel of
my automatic at my hip! I envied them their slender
spears and their daggers. If I could have but these I
might have a chance at least to take Nah-ee-lah out of
their clutches and save her from the hideous fate of slavery
among the Kalkars, for I had guessed what such slavery
would mean to her from the little that she had told me, and
I had guessed, too, that she would rather die than submit
to it. For my own part, life held little for me; I had long
since definitely given up any hope of ever returning to my
own world, or of finding the ship and being reunited with
West and Jay and Norton. There came upon me at that
moment, however, a sense of appreciation of the fact that
since we had left the village of the No-vans I had been
far from unhappy, nor could I attribute this to aught else
than the companionship of Nah-ee-lah—a realization that
convinced me that I should be utterly miserable were she
to be taken from me now. Was I to submit supinely then,
to capture and slavery for myself and worse than death
for Nah-ee-lah, with the assurance of consequent separation
from her? No. I held up my hand as a signal for
the advancing Kalkars to halt.
“Stop!” I commanded. “Before you advance farther
I wish to know your intentions toward us. We entered this
tunnel, mistaking it for that which led to the city of my companion.
Permit us to depart in peace and all will be well.”
“All will be well, anyway,” replied the leader of the Kalkars.
“You are a strange creature, such as I have never
before seen in Va-nah. Of you we know nothing except
that you are not of the Kalkars, and therefore an enemy
of the Kalkars, but this other is from Laythe.”
“You will not permit us to go in peace, then?” I demanded.
He laughed sneeringly. “Nor in any other way,” he said.
I had been standing in the aisle, with my hand upon
one of the chairs near the rostrum and now I turned to
Nah-ee-lah who was standing close beside me.
“Come,” I said to her, “follow me; stay close behind
me.”
Several of the Kalkars were coming down the main aisle
toward us, and as I turned toward them from speaking
to Nah-ee-lah, I raised the chair which my hand had
been resting upon, and swinging it quickly around my head
hurled it full in the face of the leader. As he went down
Nah-ee-lah and I ran forward, gaining a little toward the
opening of the tunnel, and then without pausing I hurled
another chair and a third and a fourth, in rapid succession.
The Kalkars tried to bring us down with their lances, but
they were so busy dodging chairs that they could not cast
their weapons accurately, and even those few which might
otherwise have struck us were warded off by my rather
remarkable engines of defense.
There had been four Kalkars advancing toward us down
the center aisle. The balance of the party had divided,
half of it circling the cave to the left and the other half
to the right, with the evident intention of coming up the
center aisle from behind us. This maneuver had started
just before I commenced hurling chairs at the four directly
in front of us, and now when those who had intended
to take us from the rear discovered that we were likely to
make our way through to the tunnel’s entrance, some of
them sprang toward us along the passageways between the
chairs, which necessitated my turning and devoting a moment’s
attention to them. One huge fellow was in the
lead, coming across the backs of the chairs leaping from
seat to seat; and being the closest to me, he was naturally
my first target. The chairs were rather heavy and the
one that I let drive at him caught him full in the chest
with an impact that brought a howl from him and toppled
him over across the backs of the chairs behind him, where
he hung limp and motionless. Then I turned my attention
again to those before us, all of whom had fallen before
my massive ammunition. Three of them lay still, but
one of them had scrambled to his feet and was in the
very act of casting his lance as I looked. I stopped the
weapon with a chair and as the fellow went down I caught
a glimpse of Nah-ee-lah from the corners of my eyes as
she snatched the lance from the first Kalkar who had fallen
and hurled it at someone behind me. I heard a scream of
rage and pain and then I turned in time to see another of
the Kalkars fall almost at my feet, the lance imbedded in
his heart.
The way before us was temporarily open, while the
Kalkars behind us had paused, momentarily, at least, in
evident consternation at the havoc I wrought with these
unseemly weapons against which they had no defense.
“Get two knives and two lances from those who have
fallen,” I cried to Nah-ee-lah, “while I hold these others
back.”
She did as I bade, and slowly we backed toward the mouth
of the tunnel. My chairs had accounted for half our enemies
when at last we stood in the opening, each armed with
a lance and a knife.
“Now, run, Nah-ee-lah, as you never ran before,” I
whispered to my companion. “I can hold them off until you
have reached the mouth of the tunnel and clambered to the
rim of the crater. If I am lucky, I will follow you.”
“I will not leave you, Julian,” she replied, “we will go
together or not at all.”
“But you must, Nah-ee-lah,” I insisted, “it is for you
that I have been fighting them. What difference can it
make in my fate where I am when in Va-nah—all here are
my enemies.”
She laid her hand gently upon my arm. “I will not
leave you, Julian,” she repeated, “and that is final.”
The Kalkars within the room were now advancing toward
us menacingly.
“Halt!” I cried to them, “you see what fate your companions
have met, because you would not let us go in
peace. That is all we ask. I am armed now and it will
be death to any who follow us.”
They paused and I saw them whispering together as Nah-ee-lah
and I backed along the corridor, a turn in which
soon shut them from our view. Then we wheeled and ran
like deer along the winding passageway. I did not feel very
safe from capture at any time, but at least I breathed a sigh
of relief after we had passed the chamber from which the
Kalkars had run us into the cul-de-sac, and we had seen
no sign of any other of their kind. We heard no sound of
pursuit, but that in itself meant nothing, since the Kalkars
are shod with soft leather sandals, the material for which,
like all their other leather trappings, is made of the skins
of Va-gas and of the prisoners from Laythe.
As we came to the pile of hooked poles which marked the
last turn before the entrance of the tunnel I breathed an
inward sigh of relief. Stooping, I gathered them all in my
arms, and then we ran on to the opening into the crater,
where I cast all but one of the poles into the abyss. That
which I retained I hooked over the lip of the crater and
then, turning to Nah-ee-lah, I bade her ascend.
“You should have saved two of the poles,” she said, “and
then we could have ascended together; but I will make
haste and you can follow me immediately, for we do not
know but that they are pursuing us. I cannot imagine that
they will let us escape thus easily.”
Even as she spoke I heard the soft patter of sandal shod
feet up the corridor.
“Make haste, Nah-ee-lah,” I cried; “they come!”
Climbing a pole is slow work at best, but when one is
suspended over the brink of a bottomless chasm and is none
too sure of the security of the hook that is holding the
pole above, one must needs move cautiously. Yet, even
so, Nah-ee-lah scrambled upward so rapidly as to fill me
with apprehension for her safety. Nor were my fears entirely
groundless, for, standing in the mouth of the tunnel,
where I could keep one eye upon Nah-ee-lah and the
other toward the turn around which my pursuers would
presently come in view, I saw the girl’s hands grasp the
rim of the crater at the very instant that the hook came
loose and the pole dropped past me into the abyss. I might
have caught it as it fell, but my whole mind was fixed upon
Nah-ee-lah and her grave danger. Would she be able to
draw herself upward, or would she fall? I saw her straining
frantically to raise her body above the edge of the volcano,
and then from up the corridor behind me came an
exultant cry and I turned to face a brawny Kalkar who was
racing toward me.
