For moments after that awful laugh had ceased reverberatingthrough the rocky room, Tars Tarkas and I stood in tense andexpectant silence. But no further sound broke the stillness,nor within the range of our vision did aught move.

At length Tars Tarkas laughed softly, after the manner of hisstrange kind when in the presence of the horrible or terrifying.It is not an hysterical laugh, but rather the genuine expressionof the pleasure they derive from the things that move Earth mento loathing or to tears.

Often and again have I seen them roll upon the groundin mad fits of uncontrollable mirth when witnessing thedeath agonies of women and little children beneath thetorture of that hellish green Martian fete--the Great Games.

I looked up at the Thark, a smile upon my own lips, for here intruth was greater need for a smiling face than a trembling chin.

"What do you make of it all?" I asked. "Where in the deuce are we?"

He looked at me in surprise.

"Where are we?" he repeated. "Do you tell me, John Carter,that you know not where you be?"

"That I am upon Barsoom is all that I can guess, and butfor you and the great white apes I should not even guessthat, for the sights I have seen this day are as unlike thethings of my beloved Barsoom as I knew it ten long yearsago as they are unlike the world of my birth.

"No, Tars Tarkas, I know not where we be."

"Where have you been since you opened the mighty portalsof the atmosphere plant years ago, after the keeper haddied and the engines stopped and all Barsoom was dying,that had not already died, of asphyxiation? Your body evenwas never found, though the men of a whole world soughtafter it for years, though the Jeddak of Helium and hisgranddaughter, your princess, offered such fabulous rewardsthat even princes of royal blood joined in the search."There was but one conclusion to reach when all efforts tolocate you had failed, and that, that you had taken the long,last pilgrimage down the mysterious River Iss, to await inthe Valley Dor upon the shores of the Lost Sea of Korusthe beautiful Dejah Thoris, your princess.

"Why you had gone none could guess, for your princess still lived--"

"Thank God," I interrupted him. "I did not dare to ask you,for I feared I might have been too late to save her--she was very low when I left her in the royal gardens ofTardos Mors that long-gone night; so very low that I scarcelyhoped even then to reach the atmosphere plant ere her dearspirit had fled from me for ever. And she lives yet?"

"She lives, John Carter."

"You have not told me where we are," I reminded him.

"We are where I expected to find you, John Carter--andanother. Many years ago you heard the story of the womanwho taught me the thing that green Martians are reared tohate, the woman who taught me to love. You know the crueltortures and the awful death her love won for her at thehands of the beast, Tal Hajus.

"She, I thought, awaited me by the Lost Sea of Korus.

"You know that it was left for a man from another world,for yourself, John Carter, to teach this cruel Thark whatfriendship is; and you, I thought, also roamed the care-freeValley Dor.

"Thus were the two I most longed for at the end of thelong pilgrimage I must take some day, and so as the timehad elapsed which Dejah Thoris had hoped might bring youonce more to her side, for she has always tried to believe thatyou had but temporarily returned to your own planet, I atlast gave way to my great yearning and a month since I startedupon the journey, the end of which you have this day witnessed. Do you understand now where you be, John Carter?"

"And that was the River Iss, emptying into the Lost Sea ofKorus in the Valley Dor?" I asked.

"This is the valley of love and peace and rest to which everyBarsoomian since time immemorial has longed to pilgrimageat the end of a life of hate and strife and bloodshed,"he replied. "This, John Carter, is Heaven."

His tone was cold and ironical; its bitterness but reflectingthe terrible disappointment he had suffered. Such a fearfuldisillusionment, such a blasting of life-long hopes and aspirations,such an uprooting of age-old tradition might have excused a vastlygreater demonstration on the part of the Thark.

I laid my hand upon his shoulder.

"I am sorry," I said, nor did there seem aught else to say.

"Think, John Carter, of the countless billions of Barsoomianswho have taken the voluntary pilgrimage down this cruel riversince the beginning of time, only to fall into the ferociousclutches of the terrible creatures that to-day assailed us.

"There is an ancient legend that once a red man returnedfrom the banks of the Lost Sea of Korus, returned from theValley Dor, back through the mysterious River Iss, and thelegend has it that he narrated a fearful blasphemy of horridbrutes that inhabited a valley of wondrous loveliness,brutes that pounced upon each Barsoomian as he terminatedhis pilgrimage and devoured him upon the banks of the LostSea where he had looked to find love and peace and happiness;but the ancients killed the blasphemer, as tradition hasordained that any shall be killed who return from the bosomof the River of Mystery.

"But now we know that it was no blasphemy, that thelegend is a true one, and that the man told only of what hesaw; but what does it profit us, John Carter, since even shouldwe escape, we also would be treated as blasphemers? Weare between the wild thoat of certainty and the mad zitidarof fact--we can escape neither."

"As Earth men say, we are between the devil and the deep sea,Tars Tarkas," I replied, nor could I help but smile at our dilemma.

"There is naught that we can do but take things as they come,and at least have the satisfaction of knowing that whoeverslays us eventually will have far greater numbers of theirown dead to count than they will get in return. White ape orplant man, green Barsoomian or red man, whosoever it shallbe that takes the last toll from us will know that it is costlyin lives to wipe out John Carter, Prince of the House ofTardos Mors, and Tars Tarkas, Jeddak of Thark, at the same time."

I could not help but laugh at him grim humour, and hejoined in with me in one of those rare laughs of realenjoyment which was one of the attributes of this fierceTharkian chief which marked him from the others of his kind.

"But about yourself, John Carter," he cried at last. "If youhave not been here all these years where indeed have youbeen, and how is it that I find you here to-day?"

"I have been back to Earth," I replied. "For ten long Earthyears I have been praying and hoping for the day that wouldcarry me once more to this grim old planet of yours, forwhich, with all its cruel and terrible customs, I feel a bondof sympathy and love even greater than for the world thatgave me birth.

"For ten years have I been enduring a living death ofuncertainty and doubt as to whether Dejah Thoris lived, andnow that for the first time in all these years my prayers havebeen answered and my doubt relieved I find myself, througha cruel whim of fate, hurled into the one tiny spot of allBarsoom from which there is apparently no escape, and ifthere were, at a price which would put out for ever the lastflickering hope which I may cling to of seeing my princessagain in this life--and you have seen to-day with what pitifulfutility man yearns toward a material hereafter.

"Only a bare half-hour before I saw you battling with theplant men I was standing in the moonlight upon the banks ofa broad river that taps the eastern shore of Earth's mostblessed land. I have answered you, my friend. Do you believe?"

"I believe," replied Tars Tarkas, "though I cannot understand."

As we talked I had been searching the interior of thechamber with my eyes. It was, perhaps, two hundred feetin length and half as broad, with what appeared to be adoorway in the centre of the wall directly opposite thatthrough which we had entered.

The apartment was hewn from the material of the cliff,showing mostly dull gold in the dim light which a singleminute radium illuminator in the centre of the roof diffusedthroughout its great dimensions. Here and there polishedsurfaces of ruby, emerald, and diamond patched the goldenwalls and ceiling. The floor was of another material, veryhard, and worn by much use to the smoothness of glass.Aside from the two doors I could discern no sign of otheraperture, and as one we knew to be locked against us Iapproached the other.

As I extended my hand to search for the controlling button,that cruel and mocking laugh rang out once more, soclose to me this time that I involuntarily shrank back,tightening my grip upon the hilt of my great sword.

And then from the far corner of the great chamber a hollowvoice chanted: "There is no hope, there is no hope;the dead return not, the dead return not; nor is thereany resurrection. Hope not, for there is no hope."

Though our eyes instantly turned toward the spot fromwhich the voice seemed to emanate, there was no one insight, and I must admit that cold shivers played along myspine and the short hairs at the base of my head stiffenedand rose up, as do those upon a hound's neck when in thenight his eyes see those uncanny things which are hiddenfrom the sight of man.

Quickly I walked toward the mournful voice, but it hadceased ere I reached the further wall, and then from the otherend of the chamber came another voice, shrill and piercing:

"Fools! Fools!" it shrieked. "Thinkest thou to defeat theeternal laws of life and death? Wouldst cheat the mysteriousIssus, Goddess of Death, of her just dues? Did not her mightymessenger, the ancient Iss, bear you upon her leaden bosomat your own behest to the Valley Dor?

"Thinkest thou, O fools, that Issus wilt give up her own?Thinkest thou to escape from whence in all the countlessages but a single soul has fled?

"Go back the way thou camest, to the merciful maws of thechildren of the Tree of Life or the gleaming fangs of thegreat white apes, for there lies speedy surcease from suffering;but insist in your rash purpose to thread the mazes of theGolden Cliffs of the Mountains of Otz, past the rampartsof the impregnable fortresses of the Holy Therns, and uponyour way Death in its most frightful form will overtake you--a death so horrible that even the Holy Therns themselves,who conceived both Life and Death, avert their eyes fromits fiendishness and close their ears against the hideousshrieks of its victims.

"Go back, O fools, the way thou camest."

And then the awful laugh broke out from another partof the chamber.

"Most uncanny," I remarked, turning to Tars Tarkas.

"What shall we do?" he asked. "We cannot fight emptyair; I would almost sooner return and face foes into whoseflesh I may feel my blade bite and know that I am sellingmy carcass dearly before I go down to that eternal oblivionwhich is evidently the fairest and most desirable eternity thatmortal man has the right to hope for."

"If, as you say, we cannot fight empty air, Tars Tarkas,"I replied, "neither, on the other hand, can empty air fight us.I, who have faced and conquered in my time thousands of sinewywarriors and tempered blades, shall not be turned back by wind;nor no more shall you, Thark."

"But unseen voices may emanate from unseen and unseeablecreatures who wield invisible blades," answered the green warrior.

"Rot, Tars Tarkas," I cried, "those voices come from beingsas real as you or as I. In their veins flows lifeblood thatmay be let as easily as ours, and the fact that they remaininvisible to us is the best proof to my mind that they aremortal; nor overly courageous mortals at that. Think you,Tars Tarkas, that John Carter will fly at the first shriek of acowardly foe who dare not come out into the open and face a good blade?"

I had spoken in a loud voice that there might be noquestion that our would-be terrorizers should hear me, for Iwas tiring of this nerve-racking fiasco. It had occurred to me,too, that the whole business was but a plan to frighten usback into the valley of death from which we had escaped, thatwe might be quickly disposed of by the savage creatures there.

For a long period there was silence, then of a sudden a soft,stealthy sound behind me caused me to turn suddenly to beholda great many-legged banth creeping sinuously upon me.

The banth is a fierce beast of prey that roams the lowhills surrounding the dead seas of ancient Mars. Like nearlyall Martian animals it is almost hairless, having only a greatbristly mane about its thick neck.

Its long, lithe body is supported by ten powerful legs, itsenormous jaws are equipped, like those of the calot, orMartian hound, with several rows of long needle-like fangs;its mouth reaches to a point far back of its tiny ears, whileits enormous, protruding eyes of green add the last touch ofterror to its awful aspect.

As it crept toward me it lashed its powerful tail againstits yellow sides, and when it saw that it was discovered itemitted the terrifying roar which often freezes its prey intomomentary paralysis in the instant that it makes its spring.

And so it launched its great bulk toward me, but itsmighty voice had held no paralysing terrors for me, andit met cold steel instead of the tender flesh its cruel jawsgaped so widely to engulf.

An instant later I drew my blade from the still heart ofthis great Barsoomian lion, and turning toward Tars Tarkaswas surprised to see him facing a similar monster.

No sooner had he dispatched his than I, turning, as thoughdrawn by the instinct of my guardian subconscious mind,beheld another of the savage denizens of the Martian wildsleaping across the chamber toward me.

From then on for the better part of an hour one hideouscreature after another was launched upon us, springingapparently from the empty air about us.

Tars Tarkas was satisfied; here was something tangible thathe could cut and slash with his great blade, while I, for mypart, may say that the diversion was a marked improvementover the uncanny voices from unseen lips.

That there was nothing supernatural about our new foes waswell evidenced by their howls of rage and pain as they feltthe sharp steel at their vitals, and the very real bloodwhich flowed from their severed arteries as they died thereal death.

I noticed during the period of this new persecution that thebeasts appeared only when our backs were turned; we never sawone really materialize from thin air, nor did I for an instantsufficiently lose my excellent reasoning faculties to be oncedeluded into the belief that the beasts came into the roomother than through some concealed and well-contrived doorway.

Among the ornaments of Tars Tarkas' leather harness,which is the only manner of clothing worn by Martians otherthan silk capes and robes of silk and fur for protection fromthe cold after dark, was a small mirror, about the bignessof a lady's hand glass, which hung midway between hisshoulders and his waist against his broad back.

Once as he stood looking down at a newly fallen antagonistmy eyes happened to fall upon this mirror and in its shinysurface I saw pictured a sight that caused me to whisper:

"Move not, Tars Tarkas! Move not a muscle!"

He did not ask why, but stood like a graven imagewhile my eyes watched the strange thing that meant somuch to us.

What I saw was the quick movement of a section of thewall behind me. It was turning upon pivots, and with it asection of the floor directly in front of it was turning. It wasas though you placed a visiting-card upon end on a silverdollar that you had laid flat upon a table, so that the edgeof the card perfectly bisected the surface of the coin.

The card might represent the section of the wall that turnedand the silver dollar the section of the floor. Both were sonicely fitted into the adjacent portions of the floor and wallthat no crack had been noticeable in the dim light of the chamber.

As the turn was half completed a great beast was revealedsitting upon its haunches upon that part of the revolving floorthat had been on the opposite side before the wall commencedto move; when the section stopped, the beast was facing towardme on our side of the partition--it was very simple.

But what had interested me most was the sight that thehalf-turned section had presented through the opening thatit had made. A great chamber, well lighted, in which wereseveral men and women chained to the wall, and in front ofthem, evidently directing and operating the movement of thesecret doorway, a wicked-faced man, neither red as are thered men of Mars, nor green as are the green men, but white,like myself, with a great mass of flowing yellow hair.

The prisoners behind him were red Martians. Chained withthem were a number of fierce beasts, such as had been turnedupon us, and others equally as ferocious.

As I turned to meet my new foe it was with a heartconsiderably lightened.

"Watch the wall at your end of the chamber, Tars Tarkas,"I cautioned, "it is through secret doorways in the wall thatthe brutes are loosed upon us." I was very close to him andspoke in a low whisper that my knowledge of their secretmight not be disclosed to our tormentors.

As long as we remained each facing an opposite end ofthe apartment no further attacks were made upon us, so itwas quite clear to me that the partitions were in some waypierced that our actions might be observed from without.

At length a plan of action occurred to me, and backing quiteclose to Tars Tarkas I unfolded my scheme in a low whisper,keeping my eyes still glued upon my end of the room.

The great Thark grunted his assent to my proposition when Ihad done, and in accordance with my plan commenced backingtoward the wall which I faced while I advanced slowly ahead of him.

When we had reached a point some ten feet from thesecret doorway I halted my companion, and cautioning himto remain absolutely motionless until I gave the prearrangedsignal I quickly turned my back to the door through whichI could almost feel the burning and baleful eyes of ourwould be executioner.

Instantly my own eyes sought the mirror upon Tars Tarkas' backand in another second I was closely watching the section of thewall which had been disgorging its savage terrors upon us.

I had not long to wait, for presently the golden surfacecommenced to move rapidly. Scarcely had it started than Igave the signal to Tars Tarkas, simultaneously springing forthe receding half of the pivoting door. In like manner theThark wheeled and leaped for the opening being made bythe inswinging section.

A single bound carried me completely through into theadjoining room and brought me face to face with the fellowwhose cruel face I had seen before. He was about my ownheight and well muscled and in every outward detail mouldedprecisely as are Earth men.

At his side hung a long-sword, a short-sword, a dagger, and oneof the destructive radium revolvers that are common upon Mars.

The fact that I was armed only with a long-sword, and soaccording to the laws and ethics of battle everywhere uponBarsoom should only have been met with a similar or lesser weapon,seemed to have no effect upon the moral sense of my enemy,for he whipped out his revolver ere I scarce had touched thefloor by his side, but an uppercut from my long-sword sent itflying from his grasp before he could discharge it.

Instantly he drew his long-sword, and thus evenly armed we set toin earnest for one of the closest battles I ever have fought.

The fellow was a marvellous swordsman and evidently in practice,while I had not gripped the hilt of a sword for ten long yearsbefore that morning.

But it did not take me long to fall easily into my fighting stride,so that in a few minutes the man began to realize that he had at lastmet his match.

His face became livid with rage as he found my guard impregnable,while blood flowed from a dozen minor wounds upon his face and body.

"Who are you, white man?" he hissed. "That you are noBarsoomian from the outer world is evident from your colour.And you are not of us."

His last statement was almost a question.

"What if I were from the Temple of Issus?" I hazarded on a wild guess.

"Fate forfend!" he exclaimed, his face going white underthe blood that now nearly covered it.

I did not know how to follow up my lead, but I carefully laidthe idea away for future use should circumstances require it.His answer indicated that for all he KNEW I might be fromthe Temple of Issus and in it were men like unto myself,and either this man feared the inmates of the temple or elsehe held their persons or their power in such reverence that hetrembled to think of the harm and indignities he had heapedupon one of them.

But my present business with him was of a different naturethan that which requires any considerable abstract reasoning;it was to get my sword between his ribs, and this I succeededin doing within the next few seconds, nor was I an instant too soon.

The chained prisoners had been watching the combat intense silence; not a sound had fallen in the room other thanthe clashing of our contending blades, the soft shuffling ofour naked feet and the few whispered words we had hissedat each other through clenched teeth the while we continuedour mortal duel.

But as the body of my antagonist sank an inert mass tothe floor a cry of warning broke from one of the female prisoners.

"Turn! Turn! Behind you!" she shrieked, and as I wheeledat the first note of her shrill cry I found myself facing asecond man of the same race as he who lay at my feet.

The fellow had crept stealthily from a dark corridor andwas almost upon me with raised sword ere I saw him. TarsTarkas was nowhere in sight and the secret panel in the wall,through which I had come, was closed.

How I wished that he were by my side now! I had foughtalmost continuously for many hours; I had passed through suchexperiences and adventures as must sap the vitality of man,and with all this I had not eaten for nearly twenty-four hours,nor slept.

I was fagged out, and for the first time in years felt aquestion as to my ability to cope with an antagonist; butthere was naught else for it than to engage my man, andthat as quickly and ferociously as lay in me, for my onlysalvation was to rush him off his feet by the impetuosity ofmy attack--I could not hope to win a long-drawn-out battle.

But the fellow was evidently of another mind, for he backedand parried and parried and sidestepped until I was almostcompletely fagged from the exertion of attempting to finish him.

He was a more adroit swordsman, if possible, than my previous foe,and I must admit that he led me a pretty chase and in the endcame near to making a sorry fool of me--and a dead one into the bargain.

I could feel myself growing weaker and weaker, until atlength objects commenced to blur before my eyes and Istaggered and blundered about more asleep than awake,and then it was that he worked his pretty little coupthat came near to losing me my life.

He had backed me around so that I stood in front of thecorpse of his fellow, and then he rushed me suddenly so thatI was forced back upon it, and as my heel struck it theimpetus of my body flung me backward across the dead man.

My head struck the hard pavement with a resoundingwhack, and to that alone I owe my life, for it cleared mybrain and the pain roused my temper, so that I was equalfor the moment to tearing my enemy to pieces with my barehands, and I verily believe that I should have attempted it hadnot my right hand, in the act of raising my body from theground, come in contact with a bit of cold metal.

As the eyes of the layman so is the hand of the fighting manwhen it comes in contact with an implement of his vocation,and thus I did not need to look or reason to know thatthe dead man's revolver, lying where it had fallen when Istruck it from his grasp, was at my disposal.

The fellow whose ruse had put me down was springing toward me,the point of his gleaming blade directed straight at my heart,and as he came there rang from his lips the cruel and mocking pealof laughter that I had heard within the Chamber of Mystery.

And so he died, his thin lips curled in the snarl of his hatefullaugh, and a bullet from the revolver of his dead companionbursting in his heart.

His body, borne by the impetus of his headlong rush, plunged upon me.The hilt of his sword must have struck my head, for with the impactof the corpse I lost consciousness.