VII
FREEDOM
Once out of the direct path of the animal, fear of it left me, but another
emotion as quickly gripped me--hope of escape that the demoralized condition of
the guards made possible for the instant.
I thought of Perry, but for the hope that I might better encompass his
release if myself free I should have put the thought of freedom from me at once.
As it was I hastened on toward the right searching for an exit toward which no
Sagoths were fleeing, and at last I found it--a low, narrow aperture leading
into a dark corridor.
Without thought of the possible consequence, I darted into the shadows of the
tunnel, feeling my way along through the gloom for some distance. The noises of
the amphitheater had grown fainter and fainter until now all was as silent as
the tomb about me. Faint light filtered from above through occasional
ventilating and lighting tubes, but it was scarce sufficient to enable my human
eyes to cope with the darkness, and so I was forced to move with extreme care,
feeling my way along step by step with a hand upon the wall beside me.
Presently the light increased and a moment later, to my delight, I came upon
a flight of steps leading upward, at the top of which the brilliant light of the
noonday sun shone through an opening in the ground.
Cautiously I crept up the stairway to the tunnel's end, and peering out saw
the broad plain of Phutra before me. The numerous lofty, granite towers which
mark the several entrances to the subterranean city were all in front of
me--behind, the plain stretched level and unbroken to the nearby foothills. I
had come to the surface, then, beyond the city, and my chances for escape seemed
much enhanced.
My first impulse was to await darkness before attempting to cross the plain,
so deeply implanted are habits of thought; but of a sudden I recollected the
perpetual noonday brilliance which envelopes Pellucidar, and with a smile I
stepped forth into the day-light.
Rank grass, waist high, grows upon the plain of Phutra--the gorgeous
flowering grass of the inner world, each particular blade of which is tipped
with a tiny, five-pointed blossom--brilliant little stars of varying colors that
twinkle in the green foliage to add still another charm to the weird, yet
lovely, land-scape.
But then the only aspect which attracted me was the distant hills in which I
hoped to find sanctuary, and so I hastened on, trampling the myriad beauties
beneath my hurrying feet. Perry says that the force of gravity is less upon the
surface of the inner world than upon that of the outer. He explained it all to
me once, but I was never particularly brilliant in such matters and so most of
it has escaped me. As I recall it the difference is due in some part to the
counter-attraction of that portion of the earth's crust directly opposite the
spot upon the face of Pellucidar at which one's calculations are being made. Be
that as it may, it always seemed to me that I moved with greater speed and
agility within Pellucidar than upon the outer surface--there was a certain airy
lightness of step that was most pleasing, and a feeling of bodily detachment
which I can only compare with that occasionally experienced in dreams.
And as I crossed Phutra's flower-bespangled plain that time I seemed almost
to fly, though how much of the sensation was due to Perry's suggestion and how
much to actuality I am sure I do not know. The more I thought of Perry the less
pleasure I took in my new-found freedom. There could be no liberty for me within
Pellucidar unless the old man shared it with me, and only the hope that I might
find some way to encompass his release kept me from turning back to Phutra.
Just how I was to help Perry I could scarce imagine, but I hoped that some
fortuitous circumstance might solve the problem for me. It was quite evident
however that little less than a miracle could aid me, for what could I
accomplish in this strange world, naked and unarmed? It was even doubtful that I
could retrace my steps to Phutra should I once pass beyond view of the plain,
and even were that possible, what aid could I bring to Perry no matter how far I
wandered?
The case looked more and more hopeless the longer I viewed it, yet with a
stubborn persistency I forged ahead toward the foothills. Behind me no sign of
pursuit developed, before me I saw no living thing. It was as though I moved
through a dead and forgotten world.
I have no idea, of course, how long it took me to reach the limit of the
plain, but at last I entered the foothills, following a pretty little canyon
upward toward the mountains. Beside me frolicked a laughing brooklet, hurrying
upon its noisy way down to the silent sea. In its quieter pools I discovered
many small fish, of four- or five-pound weight I should imagine. In appearance,
except as to size and color, they were not unlike the whale of our own seas. As
I watched them playing about I discovered, not only that they suckled their
young, but that at intervals they rose to the surface to breathe as well as to
feed upon certain grasses and a strange, scarlet lichen which grew upon the
rocks just above the water line.
It was this last habit that gave me the opportunity I craved to capture one
of these herbivorous cetaceans--that is what Perry calls them--and make as good
a meal as one can on raw, warm-blooded fish; but I had become rather used, by
this time, to the eating of food in its natural state, though I still balked on
the eyes and entrails, much to the amusement of Ghak, to whom I always passed
these delicacies.
Crouching beside the brook, I waited until one of the diminutive purple
whales rose to nibble at the long grasses which overhung the water, and then,
like the beast of prey that man really is, I sprang upon my victim, appeasing my
hunger while he yet wriggled to escape.
Then I drank from the clear pool, and after washing my hands and face
continued my flight. Above the source of the brook I encountered a rugged climb
to the summit of a long ridge. Beyond was a steep declivity to the shore of a
placid, inland sea, upon the quiet surface of which lay several beautiful
islands.
The view was charming in the extreme, and as no man or beast was to be seen
that might threaten my new-found liberty, I slid over the edge of the bluff, and
half sliding, half falling, dropped into the delightful valley, the very aspect
of which seemed to offer a haven of peace and security.
The gently sloping beach along which I walked was thickly strewn with
strangely shaped, colored shells; some empty, others still housing as varied a
multitude of mollusks as ever might have drawn out their sluggish lives along
the silent shores of the antediluvian seas of the outer crust. As I walked I
could not but compare myself with the first man of that other world, so complete
the solitude which surrounded me, so primal and untouched the virgin wonders and
beauties of adolescent nature. I felt myself a second Adam wending my lonely way
through the childhood of a world, searching for my Eve, and at the thought there
rose before my mind's eye the exquisite outlines of a perfect face surmounted by
a loose pile of wondrous, raven hair.
As I walked, my eyes were bent upon the beach so that it was not until I had
come quite upon it that I discovered that which shattered all my beautiful dream
of solitude and safety and peace and primal overlordship. The thing was a
hollowed log drawn upon the sands, and in the bottom of it lay a crude paddle.
The rude shock of awakening to what doubtless might prove some new form of
danger was still upon me when I heard a rattling of loose stones from the
direction of the bluff, and turning my eyes in that direction I beheld the
author of the disturbance, a great copper-colored man, running rapidly toward
me.
There was that in the haste with which he came which seemed quite
sufficiently menacing, so that I did not need the added evidence of brandishing
spear and scowling face to warn me that I was in no safe position, but whither
to flee was indeed a momentous question.
The speed of the fellow seemed to preclude the possibility of escaping him
upon the open beach. There was but a single alternative--the rude skiff--and
with a celerity which equaled his, I pushed the thing into the sea and as it
floated gave a final shove and clambered in over the end.
A cry of rage rose from the owner of the primitive craft, and an instant
later his heavy, stone-tipped spear grazed my shoulder and buried itself in the
bow of the boat beyond. Then I grasped the paddle, and with feverish haste urged
the awkward, wobbly thing out upon the surface of the sea.
A glance over my shoulder showed me that the copper-colored one had plunged
in after me and was swimming rapidly in pursuit. His mighty strokes bade fair to
close up the distance between us in short order, for at best I could make but
slow progress with my unfamiliar craft, which nosed stubbornly in every
direction but that which I desired to follow, so that fully half my energy was
expended in turning its blunt prow back into the course.
I had covered some hundred yards from shore when it became evident that my
pursuer must grasp the stern of the skiff within the next half-dozen strokes. In
a frenzy of despair, I bent to the grandfather of all paddles in a hopeless
effort to escape, and still the copper giant behind me gained and gained.
His hand was reaching upward for the stern when I saw a sleek, sinuous body
shoot from the depths below. The man saw it too, and the look of terror that
overspread his face assured me that I need have no further concern as to him,
for the fear of certain death was in his look.
And then about him coiled the great, slimy folds of a hideous monster of that
prehistoric deep--a mighty serpent of the sea, with fanged jaws, and darting
forked tongue, with bulging eyes, and bony protuberances upon head and snout
that formed short, stout horns.
As I looked at that hopeless struggle my eyes met those of the doomed man,
and I could have sworn that in his I saw an expression of hopeless appeal. But
whether I did or not there swept through me a sudden compassion for the fellow.
He was indeed a brother-man, and that he might have killed me with pleasure had
he caught me was forgotten in the extremity of his danger.
Unconsciously I had ceased paddling as the serpent rose to engage my pursuer,
so now the skiff still drifted close beside the two. The monster seemed to be
but playing with his victim before he closed his awful jaws upon him and dragged
him down to his dark den beneath the surface to devour him. The huge, snakelike
body coiled and uncoiled about its prey. The hideous, gaping jaws snapped in the
victim's face. The forked tongue, lightning-like, ran in and out upon the copper
skin.
Nobly the giant battled for his life, beating with his stone hatchet against
the bony armor that covered that frightful carcass; but for all the damage he
inflicted he might as well have struck with his open palm.
At last I could endure no longer to sit supinely by while a fellowman was
dragged down to a horrible death by that repulsive reptile. Embedded in the prow
of the skiff lay the spear that had been cast after me by him whom I suddenly
desired to save. With a wrench I tore it loose, and standing upright in the
wobbly log drove it with all the strength of my two arms straight into the
gaping jaws of the hydrophidian.
With a loud hiss the creature abandoned its prey to turn upon me, but the
spear, imbedded in its throat, prevented it from seizing me though it came near
to overturning the skiff in its mad efforts to reach me.
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