'Your words are the words of a man,' exclaimed Thorek. 'I will go down with you and fight.'
'What is the other way?' asked the man from Amdar.
'We have this ladder,' explained von Horst, 'and there are other ladders in the caves. By fastening some of them together we can reach the top of the cliff. We could be a long way off before the Bastians could overtake us, for they would have to go far down the gorge before they came to a place where they could climb out of it.'
'He is right,' said another slave.
'But they might overtake us,' suggested another who was timid.
'Let them!' cried Thorek. 'I am a Mammoth Man. Should I fear to fight with my enemies? Never. All my life I have fought them. It was for this that my mother bore me and my father trained me.'
'We talk too much,' said von Horst. 'Talk will not save us. Let those who wish to, come with me; let the others remain here. Fetch the other ladders. See what you can find with which to fasten them together.'
'Here comes Frug!' shouted a slave. ''He is coming up with many warriors.'
Von Horst looked down to see the hairy chief climbing upward toward the ledge; behind him came many warriors. The man from the outer crust grinned, for he knew that his position was impregnable.
'Thorek,' he said, 'take men into the caves to gather fragments of rock, but do not throw them down upon the Bastians until I give you the word.'
'I am a Mammoth Man,' replied Thorek, haughtily. 'I do not take orders from any but my chief.'
'Right now I am your chief,' snapped von Horst. 'Do as I tell you. If each of us tries to be chief, if no one will do as I order, we may stay here until we rot.'
'I take orders from no man who is not a better man than I,' insisted Thorek.
'What does he mean, Dangar?' asked von Horst.
'He means you'll have to fight him—and win—before he'll obey you,' explained the Sarian.
'Are all the rest of you fools too?' demanded von Horst. 'Do I have to fight each one of you before you will help me to help you escape?'
'If you defeat Thorek, I will obey you,' said the man from Amdar.
'Very well, then,' agreed von Horst. 'Dangar, if any of these idiots will help you, go in and get rocks to hold off Frug until the matter is settled. Just try to keep them from setting up another ladder to this ledge. Thorek, you and I will go into one of the caves and see who is head man. If we tried to decide the matter out here, we'd probably both wind up at the bottom of the cliff.'
'All right,' agreed the Mammoth Man. 'I like your talk. You will make a great chief—if you win; but you won't. I am Thorek, and I am a Mammoth Man. '
Von Horst was almost amused by the evidences of haughty pride that these primitive people revealed. He had seen it in La-ja in an exaggerated form and now, again, in Thorek. Perhaps he admired them a little for it—he had no patience with spineless worms—but he felt that they might have mixed a little common sense with it. He realized, however, that it reflected a tremendous ego, such as the human race must have possessed in its earliest stages to have permitted it to cope with the forces that must constantly have threatened it with extinction.
He turned to Thorek. 'Come,' he said; 'let's get it over, so that something worth while can be done.' As he spoke, he entered one of the caves; and Thorek followed him.
'With bare hands?' asked von Horst.
'With bare hands,' agreed the Mammoth Man.
'Come on, then.'
Von Horst, from boyhood, had been a keen devotee of all modes of defense and offense with various weapons and with none at all. He had excelled as an amateur boxer and wrestler. Heretofore it had availed him little of practical value, other than a certain prideful satisfaction in his ability; but now it was to mean very much indeed. It was to establish his position in the stone age among a rugged people who admitted no superiority that was not physical.
At his invitation, Thorek charged down upon him like a wild bull. In height they were quite evenly matched, but Thorek was stockier and outweighed von Horst by ten or fifteen pounds. Their strength was, perhaps, about equal, though the Pellucidarian looked far more powerful because of his bulging muscles. It was skill that would count, and Thorek had no skill. His strategy consisted in overwhelming an antagonist by impetus and weight, crushing him to earth, and pummeling him into insensibility. If he killed him in the process—well, that was just the other fellow's tough luck.
But when he threw himself at von Horst, von Horst was not there. He had ducked beneath the flailing arms and sidestepped the heavy body; then he had landed a heavy blow at Thorek's jaw that had snapped his head and dazed him. But the fellow still kept his feet, turned, and came lumbering in again for more; and he got it. This time he went down. He tried to stagger to his feet, and another blow sent him sprawling. He didn't have a chance. Every time he got part way to his feet, he was knocked flat again. At last he gave up and lay where he had fallen.
'Who is chief?' demanded von Horst.
'You are,' said Thorek.
VII – FLIGHT OF THE SLAVES
AS VON HORST turned and ran out of the cave, Thorek rose groggily to his feet and followed him. On the ledge a number of the slaves were lined up with Dangar ready to hurl rocks on the ascending Bastians, who von Horst saw had reached the second ledge below that occupied by the slaves.
He looked about and saw Thorek emerging from the cave. 'Take some men and get the ladders,' von Horst directed his late antagonist.
The other slaves looked quickly at the Mammoth Man to see how he would accept this command. What they saw astonished them. Thorek's face was already badly swollen, there was a cut above one eye and his nose was bleeding. His whole face and much of his body were covered with blood, which made his injuries appear graver than they really were.
Thorek turned toward the other slaves. 'Some of you go into each cave and bring out the ladders,' he said. 'Let the women find thongs with which to bind them together.'
'Who is chief?' asked one of the men so addressed.
'He is chief,' replied Thorek, pointing at von Horst.
'He is not my chief, and neither are you,' retorted the man, belligerently.
Von Horst was suddenly hopeless. How could he get anywhere, how could he accomplish anything, with such stupid egotists to contend with? Thorek, however, was not at all discouraged. He suddenly leaped upon the fellow; and before the man had time to gather his slow wits, lifted him above his head and hurled him from the cliff. Then he turned to the others. 'Get the ladders,' he said, and as one man they set about doing his bidding.
Now von Horst turned his attention again to Frug and the other warriors below. They offered an excellent target; and he could easily have driven them back had he cared to, but he had another plan. In low tones he issued instructions to his companions, having them line up along the ledge while the Bastians climbed to that directly below. In the meantime the ladders had been carried out; and the women were busy lashing several of them together, making two long ladders.
La-ja stood sullenly apart, glaring at von Horst, and making no pretense of helping the other women with their work; but the man paid no attention to her, which probably added to her resentment and her wrath. Frug was bellowing threats and commands from the ledge below, and from the bottom of the cliff the women and children were shouting encouragement to their men.
'Bring me the man called Von,' shouted Frug, 'and none of the rest of you shall be punished.'
'Come up and get him,' challenged Thorek.
'If the men of Basti were better than old women they would do something more than stand down there and shout,' taunted von Horst. He threw a small fragment of rock that struck Frug on the shoulder. 'See,' he exclaimed, 'how easily we could drive away the old women who are not strong enough to hurl their spears up here!'
That insult was too much for the Bastians. Instantly spears began to fly; but the slaves were ready, and as the weapons rose to their level they reached out and seized many of them. As the others dropped back to the Bastians, they were hurled again; and soon the slaves were armed, as von Horst had hoped.
