weight, rose quickly into the air for a short distance, turned completely over and dropped to the ground just beyond the outer wall. It had served us well and now it seemed like a living thing that had given up its life for our salvation.
We were to have little time, however, for sentimental regrets, for almost immediately a head appeared through a small opening in the roof upon which we stood. The head was followed by the body of a man, whose harness was so scant as to leave him almost nude. He was an old man with a finely shaped head, covered with scant, gray locks.
Apparent physical old age is so rare upon Barsoom as always to attract immediate attention. In the natural span of life we live often to a thousand years, but during that long period our appearance seldom changes but little. It is true that most of us meet violent death long before we reach old age, but there are some who pass the allotted span of life and others who do not care for themselves so well and these few constitute the physically old among us; evidently of such was the little old man who confronted us.
At sight of him Nur An voiced an exclamation of pleased surprise. 'Phor Tak!' he cried.
'Heigh-oo!' cackled the old man in a high falsetto. 'Who cometh from the high heavens who knows old Phor Tak?'
'It is I-Nur An!' exclaimed my friend.
'Heigh-oo!' cried Phor Tak. 'Nur An-one of Tul Axtar's pets.'
'As you once were, Phor Tak.'
'But not now-not now,' almost screamed the old man. 'The tyrant squeezed me like some juicy fruit and then cast the empty rind aside. Heigh-oo! He thought it was empty, but I pray daily to all my ancestors that he may live to know that he was wrong. I can say this with safety to you. Nur An, for I have you in my power and I promise you that you shall never live to carry word of my whereabouts to Tul Axtar.'
'Do not fear, Phor Tak,' said Nur An. 'I, too, have suffered from the villainy of the Jeddak of Jahar. You were permitted to leave the capital in peace, but all my property was confiscated and I was sentenced to death.'
'Heigh-oo! Then you hate him, too,' exclaimed the old man.
'Hate is a weak word to describe my feeling for Tul Axtar,' replied my friend.
'It is well,' said Phor Tak. 'When I saw you descending from the skies I thought that my ancestors had sent you to help me, and I know that it was indeed true. Be this another warrior from Jahar?' he added, nodding his old head toward me.
'No, Phor Tak,' replied Nur An. 'This is Hadron of Hastor, a noble of Helium, but he, too, has been wronged by Jahar.'
'Good!' exclaimed the old man. 'Now there are three of us. Heretofore I have had only slaves and women to assist me, but now with two trained warriors, young and strong, the goal of my triumph appears almost in sight.'
As the two men conversed I had recalled that part of the story that Nur An had told me in the pits of Tjanath which related to Phor Tak and his invention of the rifle that projected the disintegrating rays which had proved so deadly against the patrol boat above Helium the night of Sanoma Tora's abduction. Strange, indeed, was fate that it should have brought me into the palace of the man who held the secret that might mean so much to Helium and to all Barsoom. Strange, too, and devious had been the path along which Fate had led me, yet I knew that my ancestors were guiding me and that all must have been arranged to some good end.
When Phor Tak had heard only a portion of our story he insisted that we must be both fatigued and hungry and, like the good host that he proved to be, he conducted us down to the interior of his palace and, summoning slaves, ordered that we be bathed and fed and then permitted to retire until we were rested. We thanked him for his kindness and consideration, of which we were glad to avail ourselves.
The days that followed were both interesting and profitable. Phor Tak, surrounded only by a few faithful slaves who had followed him into his exile, was delighted with our company and with the assistance which we could give him in his experiment, which, once assured of our loyalty, he explained to us in detail.
He told us the story of his wanderings after he had left Jahar and of how he had stumbled upon this long deserted castle, whose builder and occupants had left no record other than their bones. He told us that when he discovered it skeletons had strewn the courtyard and in the main entrance were piled the bones of a score of warriors, attesting the fierce defense that the occupants had waged against some unknown enemy, while in many of the upper rooms he had found other skeletons- the skeletons of women and children.
'I believe,' he said, 'that the place was beset by members of some savage horde of green warriors that left not a single survivor. The courts and gardens were overgrown with weeds and the interior of the building was filled with dust, but otherwise little damage had been done. I call it Jhama, and here I am carrying on my life's work.'
'And that?' I asked.
'Revenge upon Tul Axtar,' said the old man. 'I gave him the disintegrating ray; I gave him the insulating paint that protects his own ships and weapons from it, and now some day I shall give him something else- something that will be as revolutionary in the art of war as the disintegrating ray itself; something that will cast the fleet of Jahar broken wrecks upon the ground; something that will search out the palace of Tul Axtar and bury the tyrant beneath its ruins.'
We had not been long at Jhama before both Nur An and I became convinced that Phor Tak's mind was at least slightly deranged from long brooding over the wrongs inflicted upon him by Tul Axtar; though naturally possessed of a kindly disposition he was obsessed by a maniacal desire to wreak vengeance upon the tyrant with utter disregard of the consequences to himself and to others. Upon this single subject he was beyond the influence of reason and having established to his own satisfaction that Nur An and I were potential factors in the successful accomplishment of his design, he would fly into a perfect frenzy of rage whenever I broached the subject of our departure.
Fretting as I was beneath the urge to push on to Jahar and the rescue of Sanoma Tora, I could but illy brook this enforced delay, but Phor Tak was adamant-he would not permit me to depart-and the absolute loyalty of his slaves made it possible for him to enforce his will. In our hearing he explained to them that we were guests, honored guests as long as we made no effort to depart without his permission, but should they discover us in an attempt to leave Jhama surreptitiously they were to destroy us.
Nur An and I discussed the matter at length. We had discovered that four thousand haads of difficult and unfriendly country lay between us and Jahar. Being without a ship and without thoats there was little likelihood that we should be able to reach Jahar in time to be of service to Sanoma Tora, if we ever reached it at all, and so we agreed to bide our time, impressing Phor Tak with our willingness to aid him in the hope that eventually we should be able to enlist his aid and support, and so successful were we that within a short time we had so won the confidence of the old scientist that we began to entertain hope that he would take us into his innermost confidence and reveal the nature of the instrument of destruction which he was preparing for Tul Axtar.
I must admit that I was principally interested in his invention because I was confident that in order to utilize it against Tul Axtar he must find some means of transporting it to Jahar and in this I saw an opportunity for reaching the capital of the tyrant myself.
We had been in Jhama about ten days during which time Phor Tak exhibited signs of extreme nervousness and irritability. He kept us with him practically all of the time that he was not closeted in the innermost recesses of his secret laboratory.
During the evening meal upon the tenth day Phor Tak seemed more distraught than ever. Talking, as usual, interminably about his hatred of Tul Axtar, his countenance assumed an expression of maniacal fury.
'But I am helpless,' he almost screamed at last. 'I am helpless because there is no one to whom I may entrust my secret, who also has the courage and intelligence to carry out my plan. I am too old, too weak to undergo the hardships that would mean nothing to young men like you, but which must be undergone if I am to fulfill my destiny as the savior of Jahar. If I could but trust you! If I could but trust you!'
'Perhaps you can, Phor Tak,' I suggested.
The words or my tone seemed to soothe him. 'Heigh-oo!' he exclaimed. 'Sometimes I almost think that I can.'
'We have a common aim,' I said; 'or at least different aims which converge at the same point-Jahar. Let us work together then. We wish to reach Jahar. If you can help us, we will help you.'
He sat in silent thought for a long moment. 'I'll do it,' he said. 'Heigh-oo! I'll do it. Come,' and rising from his
