I did not languish long within the prison of Salensus Oll.During the short time that I lay there, fettered with chains of gold,I often wondered as to the fate of Thuvan Dihn, Jeddak of Ptarth.

My brave companion had followed me into the garden as I attacked Thurid,and when Salensus Oll had left with Dejah Thoris and the others,leaving Thuvia of Ptarth behind, he, too, had remained in the gardenwith his daughter, apparently unnoticed, for he was appareledsimilarly to the guards.

The last I had seen of him he stood waiting for the warriorswho escorted me to close the gate behind them, that he might bealone with Thuvia. Could it be possible that they had escaped?I doubted it, and yet with all my heart I hoped that it might be true.

The third day of my incarceration brought a dozen warriors toescort me to the audience chamber, where Salensus Oll himself wasto try me. A great number of nobles crowded the room, and amongthem I saw Thurid, but Matai Shang was not there.

Dejah Thoris, as radiantly beautiful as ever, sat upon a smallthrone beside Salensus Oll. The expression of sad hopelessnessupon her dear face cut deep into my heart.

Her position beside the Jeddak of Jeddaks boded ill for her and me,and on the instant that I saw her there, there sprang to my mindthe firm intention never to leave that chamber alive if I mustleave her in the clutches of this powerful tyrant.

I had killed better men than Salensus Oll, and killed themwith my bare hands, and now I swore to myself that I should killhim if I found that the only way to save the Princess of Helium.That it would mean almost instant death for me I cared not, exceptthat it would remove me from further efforts in behalf of DejahThoris, and for this reason alone I would have chosen another way,for even though I should kill Salensus Oll that act would notrestore my beloved wife to her own people. I determined towait the final outcome of the trial, that I might learn all that Icould of the Okarian ruler's intentions, and then act accordingly.

Scarcely had I come before him than Salensus Oll summoned Thurid also.

"Dator Thurid," he said, "you have made a strange request of me;but, in accordance with your wishes and your promise that it willresult only to my interests, I have decided to accede.

"You tell me that a certain announcement will be the means ofconvicting this prisoner and, at the same time, open the way to thegratification of my dearest wish."

Thurid nodded.

"Then shall I make the announcement here before all my nobles,"continued Salensus Oll. "For a year no queen has sat upon thethrone beside me, and now it suits me to take to wife one whois reputed the most beautiful woman upon Barsoom. A statementwhich none may truthfully deny.

"Nobles of Okar, unsheathe your swords and do homage to DejahThoris, Princess of Helium and future Queen of Okar, for at the endof the allotted ten days she shall become the wife of Salensus Oll."

As the nobles drew their blades and lifted them on high, inaccordance with the ancient custom of Okar when a jeddak announceshis intention to wed, Dejah Thoris sprang to her feet and, raisingher hand aloft, cried in a loud voice that they desist.

"I may not be the wife of Salensus Oll," she pleaded, "foralready I be a wife and mother. John Carter, Prince of Helium,still lives. I know it to be true, for I overheard Matai Shangtell his daughter Phaidor that he had seen him in Kaor, at thecourt of Kulan Tith, Jeddak. A jeddak does not wed a marriedwoman, nor will Salensus Oll thus violate the bonds of matrimony."

Salensus Oll turned upon Thurid with an ugly look.

"Is this the surprise you held in store for me?" he cried."You assured me that no obstacle which might not be easilyovercome stood between me and this woman, and now I find thatthe one insuperable obstacle intervenes. What mean you, man?What have you to say?"

"And should I deliver John Carter into your hands, Salensus Oll,would you not feel that I had more than satisfied the promisethat I made you?" answered Thurid.

"Talk not like a fool," cried the enraged jeddak. "I am nochild to be thus played with."

"I am talking only as a man who knows," replied Thurid."Knows that he can do all that he claims."

"Then turn John Carter over to me within ten days or yourselfsuffer the end that I should mete out to him were he in my power!"snapped the Jeddak of Jeddaks, with an ugly scowl.

"You need not wait ten days, Salensus Oll," replied Thurid;and then, turning suddenly upon me as he extended a pointingfinger, he cried: "There stands John Carter, Prince of Helium!"

"Fool!" shrieked Salensus Oll. "Fool! John Carter is a white man.This fellow be as yellow as myself. John Carter's face issmooth--Matai Shang has described him to me. This prisoner has abeard and mustache as large and black as any in Okar. Quick,guardsmen, to the pits with the black maniac who wishes to throwhis life away for a poor joke upon your ruler!"

"Hold!" cried Thurid, and springing forward before I could guesshis intention, he had grasped my beard and ripped the whole falsefabric from my face and head, revealing my smooth, tanned skinbeneath and my close-cropped black hair.

Instantly pandemonium reigned in the audience chamber of Salensus Oll.Warriors pressed forward with drawn blades, thinking that I might becontemplating the assassination of the Jeddak of Jeddaks; while others,out of curiosity to see one whose name was familiar from pole to pole,crowded behind their fellows.

As my identity was revealed I saw Dejah Thoris spring to her feet--amazement writ large upon her face--and then through that jam ofarmed men she forced her way before any could prevent. A momentonly and she was before me with outstretched arms and eyes filledwith the light of her great love.

"John Carter! John Carter!" she cried as I folded her to my breast,and then of a sudden I knew why she had denied me in the gardenbeneath the tower.

What a fool I had been! Expecting that she would penetrate the marvelousdisguise that had been wrought for me by the barber of Marentina!She had not known me, that was all; and when she saw the sign of lovefrom a stranger she was offended and righteously indignant. Indeed,but I had been a fool.

"And it was you," she cried, "who spoke to me from the tower!How could I dream that my beloved Virginian lay behind that fiercebeard and that yellow skin?"

She had been wont to call me her Virginian as a term of endearment,for she knew that I loved the sound of that beautiful name,made a thousand times more beautiful and hallowed by her dear lips,and as I heard it again after all those long years my eyesbecame dimmed with tears and my voice choked with emotion.

But an instant did I crush that dear form to me ere Salensus Oll,trembling with rage and jealousy, shouldered his way to us.

"Seize the man," he cried to his warriors, and a hundred ruthlesshands tore us apart.

Well it was for the nobles of the court of Okar that John Carterhad been disarmed. As it was, a dozen of them felt the weightof my clenched fists, and I had fought my way half up thesteps before the throne to which Salensus Oll had carried DejahThoris ere ever they could stop me.

Then I went down, fighting, beneath a half-hundred warriors; butbefore they had battered me into unconsciousness I heard that fromthe lips of Dejah Thoris that made all my suffering well worth while.

Standing there beside the great tyrant, who clutched her by the arm,she pointed to where I fought alone against such awful odds.

"Think you, Salensus Oll, that the wife of such as he is," she cried,"would ever dishonor his memory, were he a thousand times dead,by mating with a lesser mortal? Lives there upon any world suchanother as John Carter, Prince of Helium? Lives there anotherman who could fight his way back and forth across a warlike planet,facing savage beasts and hordes of savage men, for the love of a woman?

"I, Dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium, am his. He fought for me and won me.If you be a brave man you will honor the bravery that is his, and you willnot kill him. Make him a slave if you will, Salensus Oll; but spare his life.I would rather be a slave with such as he than be Queen of Okar."

"Neither slave nor queen dictates to Salensus Oll," replied theJeddak of Jeddaks. "John Carter shall die a natural death in thePit of Plenty, and the day he dies Dejah Thoris shall become my queen."

I did not hear her reply, for it was then that a blow upon myhead brought unconsciousness, and when I recovered my senses onlya handful of guardsmen remained in the audience chamber with me.As I opened my eyes they goaded me with the points of their swordsand bade me rise.

Then they led me through long corridors to a court far toward thecenter of the palace.

In the center of the court was a deep pit, near the edge of which stoodhalf a dozen other guardsmen, awaiting me. One of them carried a longrope in his hands, which he commenced to make ready as we approached.

We had come to within fifty feet of these men when I felt asudden strange and rapid pricking sensation in one of my fingers.

For a moment I was nonplused by the odd feeling, and then therecame to me recollection of that which in the stress of my adventureI had entirely forgotten--the gift ring of Prince Talu of Marentina.

Instantly I looked toward the group we were nearing, at thesame time raising my left hand to my forehead, that the ring mightbe visible to one who sought it. Simultaneously one of the waitingwarriors raised his left hand, ostensibly to brush back his hair,and upon one of his fingers I saw the duplicate of my own ring.

A quick look of intelligence passed between us, after which I keptmy eyes turned away from the warrior and did not look at him again,for fear that I might arouse the suspicion of the Okarians.When we reached the edge of the pit I saw that it was very deep,and presently I realized I was soon to judge just how far itextended below the surface of the court, for he who held the ropepassed it about my body in such a way that it could be releasedfrom above at any time; and then, as all the warriors grasped it,he pushed me forward, and I fell into the yawning abyss.

After the first jerk as I reached the end of the rope thathad been paid out to let me fall below the pit's edge theylowered me quickly but smoothly. The moment before the plunge,while two or three of the men had been assisting in adjusting therope about me, one of them had brought his mouth close to my cheek,and in the brief interval before I was cast into the forbiddinghole he breathed a single word into my ear:

"Courage!"

The pit, which my imagination had pictured as bottomless, proved to benot more than a hundred feet in depth; but as its walls were smoothlypolished it might as well have been a thousand feet, for I could neverhope to escape without outside assistance.

For a day I was left in darkness; and then, quite suddenly,a brilliant light illumined my strange cell. I was reasonablyhungry and thirsty by this time, not having tasted food or drinksince the day prior to my incarceration.

To my amazement I found the sides of the pit, that I hadthought smooth, lined with shelves, upon which were the mostdelicious viands and liquid refreshments that Okar afforded.

With an exclamation of delight I sprang forward to partake ofsome of the welcome food, but ere ever I reached it the lightwas extinguished, and, though I groped my way about the chamber,my hands came in contact with nothing beside the smooth, hard wallthat I had felt on my first examination of my prison.

Immediately the pangs of hunger and thirst began to assail me.Where before I had had but a mild craving for food and drink,I now actually suffered for want of it, and all because of thetantalizing sight that I had had of food almost within my grasp.

Once more darkness and silence enveloped me, a silence that wasbroken only by a single mocking laugh.

For another day nothing occurred to break the monotony of myimprisonment or relieve the suffering superinduced by hungerand thirst. Slowly the pangs became less keen, as sufferingdeaded the activity of certain nerves; and then the lightflashed on once again, and before me stood an array of newand tempting dishes, with great bottles of clear water andflagons of refreshing wine, upon the outside of which thecold sweat of condensation stood.

Again, with the hunger madness of a wild beast, I sprangforward to seize those tempting dishes; but, as before,the light went out and I came to a sudden stop against a hard wall.

Then the mocking laugh rang out for a second time.

The Pit of Plenty!

Ah, what a cruel mind must have devised this exquisite,hellish torture! Day after day was the thing repeated,until I was on the verge of madness; and then, as I haddone in the pits of the Warhoons, I took a new, firm holdupon my reason and forced it back into the channels of sanity.

By sheer will-power I regained control over my tottering mentality,and so successful was I that the next time that the light came I satquite still and looked indifferently at the fresh and tempting foodalmost within my reach. Glad I was that I had done so, for it gave mean opportunity to solve the seeming mystery of those vanishing banquets.

As I made no move to reach the food, the torturers left the lightturned on in the hope that at last I could refrain no longer fromgiving them the delicious thrill of enjoyment that my former futileefforts to obtain it had caused.

And as I sat scrutinizing the laden shelves I presently sawhow the thing was accomplished, and so simple was it that Iwondered I had not guessed it before. The wall of my prison was ofclearest glass--behind the glass were the tantalizing viands.

After nearly an hour the light went out, but this time there wasno mocking laughter--at least not upon the part of my tormentors;but I, to be at quits with them, gave a low laugh that none mightmistake for the cackle of a maniac.

Nine days passed, and I was weak from hunger and thirst, but nolonger suffering--I was past that. Then, down through thedarkness above, a little parcel fell to the floor at my side.

Indifferently I groped for it, thinking it but some newinvention of my jailers to add to my sufferings.

At last I found it--a tiny package wrapped in paper, at theend of a strong and slender cord. As I opened it a few lozengesfell to the floor. As I gathered them up, feeling of them andsmelling of them, I discovered that they were tablets ofconcentrated food such as are quite common in all parts of Barsoom.

Poison! I thought.

Well, what of it? Why not end my misery now rather than drag outa few more wretched days in this dark pit? Slowly I raised oneof the little pellets to my lips.

"Good-bye, my Dejah Thoris!" I breathed. "I have lived foryou and fought for you, and now my next dearest wish is to berealized, for I shall die for you," and, taking the morselin my mouth, I devoured it.

One by one I ate them all, nor ever did anything taste betterthan those tiny bits of nourishment, within which I knew must liethe seeds of death--possibly of some hideous, torturing death.

As I sat quietly upon the floor of my prison, waiting for the end,my fingers by accident came in contact with the bit of paperin which the things had been wrapped; and as I idly played with it,my mind roaming far back into the past, that I might live again fora few brief moments before I died some of the many happy moments ofa long and happy life, I became aware of strange protuberances uponthe smooth surface of the parchment-like substance in my hands.

For a time they carried no special significance to my mind--Imerely was mildly wondrous that they were there; but at last theyseemed to take form, and then I realized that there was but asingle line of them, like writing.

Now, more interestedly, my fingers traced and retraced them.There were four separate and distinct combinations of raised lines.Could it be that these were four words, and that they were intendedto carry a message to me?

The more I thought of it the more excited I became, until myfingers raced madly back and forth over those bewilderinglittle hills and valleys upon that bit of paper.

But I could make nothing of them, and at last I decidedthat my very haste was preventing me from solving the mystery.Then I took it more slowly. Again and again my forefingertraced the first of those four combinations.

Martian writing is rather difficult to explain to an Earth man--it is something of a cross between shorthand and picture-writing,and is an entirely different language from the spoken language of Mars.

Upon Barsoom there is but a single oral language.

It is spoken today by every race and nation, just as it was atthe beginning of human life upon Barsoom. It has grown with thegrowth of the planet's learning and scientific achievements, but soingenious a thing it is that new words to express new thoughts ordescribe new conditions or discoveries form themselves--no otherword could explain the thing that a new word is required for otherthan the word that naturally falls to it, and so, no matter how farremoved two nations or races, their spoken languages are identical.

Not so their written languages, however. No two nations have thesame written language, and often cities of the same nation havea written language that differs greatly from that of the nationto which they belong.

Thus it was that the signs upon the paper, if in reality theywere words, baffled me for some time; but at last I made outthe first one.

It was "courage," and it was written in the letters of Marentina.

Courage!

That was the word the yellow guardsman had whispered in my earas I stood upon the verge of the Pit of Plenty.

The message must be from him, and he I knew was a friend.

With renewed hope I bent my every energy to the deciphering ofthe balance of the message, and at last success rewarded myendeavor--I had read the four words:

"Courage! Follow the rope."

"FOLLOW THE ROPE"

What could it mean?

"Follow the rope." What rope?

Presently I recalled the cord that had been attached to theparcel when it fell at my side, and after a little groping my handcame in contact with it again. It depended from above, and when Ipulled upon it I discovered that it was rigidly fastened, possiblyat the pit's mouth.

Upon examination I found that the cord, though small, was amply ableto sustain the weight of several men. Then I made another discovery--there was a second message knotted in the rope at about the heightof my head. This I deciphered more easily, now that the key was mine.

"Bring the rope with you. Beyond the knots lies danger."

That was all there was to this message. It was evidentlyhastily formed--an afterthought.

I did not pause longer than to learn the contents of thesecond message, and, though I was none too sure of themeaning of the final admonition, "Beyond the knots lies danger,"yet I was sure that here before me lay an avenue of escape,and that the sooner I took advantage of it the more likelywas I to win to liberty.

At least, I could be but little worse off than I had been inthe Pit of Plenty.

I was to find, however, ere I was well out of that damnablehole that I might have been very much worse off had I beencompelled to remain there another two minutes.

It had taken me about that length of time to ascend some fiftyfeet above the bottom when a noise above attracted my attention.To my chagrin I saw that the covering of the pit was being removedfar above me, and in the light of the courtyard beyond I saw anumber of yellow warriors.

Could it be that I was laboriously working my way into some new trap? Were the messages spurious, after all? And then, just as my hope andcourage had ebbed to their lowest, I saw two things.

One was the body of a huge, struggling, snarling apt being loweredover the side of the pit toward me, and the other was an aperturein the side of the shaft--an aperture larger than a man's body,into which my rope led.

Just as I scrambled into the dark hole before me the apt passed me,reaching out with his mighty hands to clutch me, and snapping, growling,and roaring in a most frightful manner.

Plainly now I saw the end for which Salensus Oll had destined me.After first torturing me with starvation he had caused thisfierce beast to be lowered into my prison to finish the work thatthe jeddak's hellish imagination had conceived.

And then another truth flashed upon me--I had lived nine daysof the allotted ten which must intervene before Salensus Oll couldmake Dejah Thoris his queen. The purpose of the apt was to insuremy death before the tenth day.

I almost laughed aloud as I thought how Salensus Oll's measureof safety was to aid in defeating the very end he sought, for whenthey discovered that the apt was alone in the Pit of Plenty theycould not know but that he had completely devoured me, and so nosuspicion of my escape would cause a search to be made for me.

Coiling the rope that had carried me thus far upon my strangejourney, I sought for the other end, but found that as I followedit forward it extended always before me. So this was the meaningof the words: "Follow the rope."

The tunnel through which I crawled was low and dark. I had followedit for several hundred yards when I felt a knot beneath my fingers."Beyond the knots lies danger."

Now I went with the utmost caution, and a moment later a sharpturn in the tunnel brought me to an opening into a large,brilliantly lighted chamber.

The trend of the tunnel I had been traversing had been slightly upward,and from this I judged that the chamber into which I now found myselflooking must be either on the first floor of the palace or directlybeneath the first floor.

Upon the opposite wall were many strange instruments and devices,and in the center of the room stood a long table, at which two menwere seated in earnest conversation.

He who faced me was a yellow man--a little, wizened-up,pasty-faced old fellow with great eyes that showed thewhite round the entire circumference of the iris.

His companion was a black man, and I did not need to see hisface to know that it was Thurid, for there was no other of theFirst Born north of the ice-barrier.

Thurid was speaking as I came within hearing of the men's voices.

"Solan," he was saying, "there is no risk and the reward is great.You know that you hate Salensus Oll and that nothing wouldplease you more than to thwart him in some cherished plan.There be nothing that he more cherishes today than the ideaof wedding the beautiful Princess of Helium; but I, too,want her, and with your help I may win her.

"You need not more than step from this room for an instantwhen I give you the signal. I will do the rest, and then, when Iam gone, you may come and throw the great switch back into its place,and all will be as before. I need but an hour's start to be safebeyond the devilish power that you control in this hidden chamberbeneath the palace of your master. See how easy," and withthe words the black dator rose from his seat and, crossing theroom, laid his hand upon a large, burnished lever that protrudedfrom the opposite wall.

"No! No!" cried the little old man, springing after him, with awild shriek. "Not that one! Not that one! That controls thesunray tanks, and should you pull it too far down, all Kadabrawould be consumed by heat before I could replace it. Come away!Come away! You know not with what mighty powers you play.This is the lever that you seek. Note well the symbol inlaidin white upon its ebon surface."

Thurid approached and examined the handle of the lever.

"Ah, a magnet," he said. "I will remember. It is settledthen I take it," he continued.

The old man hesitated. A look of combined greed andapprehension overspread his none too beautiful features.

"Double the figure," he said. "Even that were all too smallan amount for the service you ask. Why, I risk my life by evenentertaining you here within the forbidden precincts of my station.Should Salensus Oll learn of it he would have me thrown to the aptsbefore the day was done."

"He dare not do that, and you know it full well, Solan,"contradicted the black. "Too great a power of life and deathyou hold over the people of Kadabra for Salensus Oll ever to riskthreatening you with death. Before ever his minions could laytheir hands upon you, you might seize this very lever from whichyou have just warned me and wipe out the entire city."

"And myself into the bargain," said Solan, with a shudder.

"But if you were to die, anyway, you would find the nerve to do it,"replied Thurid.

"Yes," muttered Solan, "I have often thought upon that very thing.Well, First Born, is your red princess worth the price I ask for myservices, or will you go without her and see her in the arms ofSalensus Oll tomorrow night?"

"Take your price, yellow man," replied Thurid, with an oath."Half now and the balance when you have fulfilled your contract."

With that the dator threw a well-filled money-pouch upon the table.

Solan opened the pouch and with trembling fingers counted its contents.His weird eyes assumed a greedy expression, and his unkempt beardand mustache twitched with the muscles of his mouth and chin.It was quite evident from his very mannerism that Thurid hadkeenly guessed the man's weakness--even the clawlike, clutchingmovement of the fingers betokened the avariciousness of the miser.

Having satisfied himself that the amount was correct, Solanreplaced the money in the pouch and rose from the table.

"Now," he said, "are you quite sure that you know the way toyour destination? You must travel quickly to cover the groundto the cave and from thence beyond the Great Power, all withina brief hour, for no more dare I spare you."

"Let me repeat it to you," said Thurid, "that you may see ifI be letter-perfect."

"Proceed," replied Solan.

"Through yonder door," he commenced, pointing to a door at thefar end of the apartment, "I follow a corridor, passing threediverging corridors upon my right; then into the fourth right-handcorridor straight to where three corridors meet; here again Ifollow to the right, hugging the left wall closely to avoid the pit.

"At the end of this corridor I shall come to a spiral runway,which I must follow down instead of up; after that the wayis along but a single branchless corridor. Am I right?"

"Quite right, Dator," answered Solan; "and now begone. Alreadyhave you tempted fate too long within this forbidden place."

"Tonight, or tomorrow, then, you may expect the signal," said Thurid,rising to go.

"Tonight, or tomorrow," repeated Solan, and as the door closedbehind his guest the old man continued to mutter as he turnedback to the table, where he again dumped the contents of themoney-pouch, running his fingers through the heap of shining metal;piling the coins into little towers; counting, recounting, and fondlingthe wealth the while he muttered on and on in a crooning undertone.

Presently his fingers ceased their play; his eyes popped wider than everas they fastened upon the door through which Thurid had disappeared.The croon changed to a querulous muttering, and finally to an ugly growl.

Then the old man rose from the table, shaking his fist at the closed door.Now he raised his voice, and his words came distinctly.

"Fool!" he muttered. "Think you that for your happiness Solanwill give up his life? If you escaped, Salensus Oll wouldknow that only through my connivance could you have succeeded.Then would he send for me. What would you have me do? Reduce thecity and myself to ashes? No, fool, there is a better way--a betterway for Solan to keep thy money and be revenged upon Salensus Oll."

He laughed in a nasty, cackling note.

"Poor fool! You may throw the great switch that will give youthe freedom of the air of Okar, and then, in fatuous security,go on with thy red princess to the freedom of--death. When you havepassed beyond this chamber in your flight, what can prevent Solanreplacing the switch as it was before your vile hand touched it?Nothing; and then the Guardian of the North will claim you and yourwoman, and Salensus Oll, when he sees your dead bodies, will neverdream that the hand of Solan had aught to do with the thing."

Then his voice dropped once more into mutterings that I couldnot translate, but I had heard enough to cause me to guess agreat deal more, and I thanked the kind Providence that had ledme to this chamber at a time so filled with importance to DejahThoris and myself as this.

But how to pass the old man now! The cord, almost invisibleupon the floor, stretched straight across the apartment to a doorupon the far side.

There was no other way of which I knew, nor could I afford toignore the advice to "follow the rope." I must cross this room,but however I should accomplish it undetected with that old manin the very center of it baffled me.

Of course I might have sprung in upon him and with my bare handssilenced him forever, but I had heard enough to convince me thatwith him alive the knowledge that I had gained might serve meat some future moment, while should I kill him and another bestationed in his place Thurid would not come hither with DejahThoris, as was quite evidently his intention.

As I stood in the dark shadow of the tunnel's end racking mybrain for a feasible plan the while I watched, catlike, the oldman's every move, he took up the money-pouch and crossed to oneend of the apartment, where, bending to his knees, he fumbled witha panel in the wall.

Instantly I guessed that here was the hiding place in which hehoarded his wealth, and while he bent there, his back toward me, Ientered the chamber upon tiptoe, and with the utmost stealthessayed to reach the opposite side before he should complete histask and turn again toward the room's center.

Scarcely thirty steps, all told, must I take, and yet itseemed to my overwrought imagination that that farther wall wasmiles away; but at last I reached it, nor once had I taken my eyesfrom the back of the old miser's head.

He did not turn until my hand was upon the button that controlledthe door through which my way led, and then he turned awayfrom me as I passed through and gently closed the door.

For an instant I paused, my ear close to the panel, to learnif he had suspected aught, but as no sound of pursuit came fromwithin I wheeled and made my way along the new corridor, followingthe rope, which I coiled and brought with me as I advanced.

But a short distance farther on I came to the rope's end ata point where five corridors met. What was I to do? Whichway should I turn? I was nonplused.

A careful examination of the end of the rope revealed the factthat it had been cleanly cut with some sharp instrument. This factand the words that had cautioned me that danger lay beyond theKNOTS convinced me that the rope had been severed since my friendhad placed it as my guide, for I had but passed a single knot,whereas there had evidently been two or more in the entire lengthof the cord.

Now, indeed, was I in a pretty fix, for neither did I knowwhich avenue to follow nor when danger lay directly in my path;but there was nothing else to be done than follow one of the corridors,for I could gain nothing by remaining where I was.

So I chose the central opening, and passed on into its gloomydepths with a prayer upon my lips.

The floor of the tunnel rose rapidly as I advanced, and amoment later the way came to an abrupt end before a heavy door.

I could hear nothing beyond, and, with my accustomed rashness,pushed the portal wide to step into a room filled with yellowwarriors.

The first to see me opened his eyes wide in astonishment, andat the same instant I felt the tingling sensation in my fingerthat denoted the presence of a friend of the ring.

Then others saw me, and there was a concerted rush to lay hands upon me,for these were all members of the palace guard--men familiar with my face.

The first to reach me was the wearer of the mate to my strange ring,and as he came close he whispered: "Surrender to me!" then in aloud voice shouted: "You are my prisoner, white man," and menacedme with his two weapons.

And so John Carter, Prince of Helium, meekly surrendered to asingle antagonist. The others now swarmed about us, asking manyquestions, but I would not talk to them, and finally my captorannounced that he would lead me back to my cell.

An officer ordered several other warriors to accompany him,and a moment later we were retracing the way I had just come.My friend walked close beside me, asking many silly questionsabout the country from which I had come, until finally hisfellows paid no further attention to him or his gabbling.

Gradually, as he spoke, he lowered his voice, so that presently he wasable to converse with me in a low tone without attracting attention.His ruse was a clever one, and showed that Talu had not misjudgedthe man's fitness for the dangerous duty upon which he was detailed.

When he had fully assured himself that the other guardsmen werenot listening, he asked me why I had not followed the rope,and when I told him that it had ended at the five corridors he saidthat it must have been cut by someone in need of a piece of rope,for he was sure that "the stupid Kadabrans would never have guessedits purpose."

Before we had reached the spot from which the five corridorsdiverge my Marentinian friend had managed to drop to the rear ofthe little column with me, and when we came in sight of thebranching ways he whispered:

"Run up the first upon the right. It leads to the watchtower uponthe south wall. I will direct the pursuit up the next corridor,"and with that he gave me a great shove into the dark mouth ofthe tunnel, at the same time crying out in simulated painand alarm as he threw himself upon the floor as though I hadfelled him with a blow.

From behind the voices of the excited guardsmen camereverberating along the corridor, suddenly growing fainter asTalu's spy led them up the wrong passageway in fancied pursuit.

As I ran for my life through the dark galleries beneath the palaceof Salensus Oll I must indeed have presented a remarkable appearancehad there been any to note it, for though death loomed large about me,my face was split by a broad grin as I thought of the resourcefulnessof the nameless hero of Marentina to whom I owed my life.

Of such stuff are the men of my beloved Helium, and when I meet anotherof their kind, of whatever race or color, my heart goes out to him asit did now to my new friend who had risked his life for me simplybecause I wore the mate to the ring his ruler had put upon his finger.

The corridor along which I ran led almost straight fora considerable distance, terminating at the foot of aspiral runway, up which I proceeded to emerge presentlyinto a circular chamber upon the first floor of a tower.

In this apartment a dozen red slaves were employed polishingor repairing the weapons of the yellow men. The walls of theroom were lined with racks in which were hundreds of straight andhooked swords, javelins, and daggers. It was evidently an armory.There were but three warriors guarding the workers.

My eyes took in the entire scene at a glance. Here were weaponsin plenty! Here were sinewy red warriors to wield them!

And here now was John Carter, Prince of Helium, in need bothof weapons and warriors!

As I stepped into the apartment, guards and prisoners saw mesimultaneously.

Close to the entrance where I stood was a rack of straightswords, and as my hand closed upon the hilt of one of them my eyesfell upon the faces of two of the prisoners who worked side by side.

One of the guards started toward me. "Who are you?" he demanded."What do you here?"

"I come for Tardos Mors, Jeddak of Helium, and his son, Mors Kajak,"I cried, pointing to the two red prisoners, who had nowsprung to their feet, wide-eyed in astonished recognition.

"Rise, red men! Before we die let us leave a memorial in thepalace of Okar's tyrant that will stand forever in the annals ofKadabra to the honor and glory of Helium," for I had seen that allthe prisoners there were men of Tardos Mors's navy.

Then the first guardsman was upon me and the fight was on,but scarce did we engage ere, to my horror, I saw that thered slaves were shackled to the floor.