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serviceable arms a new light came into the pain-dulled eyes of the panthan. With
a quick step he crossed to the side of the dead warrior and dragged him from his
mount. With equal celerity he stripped him of his harness and his arms, and
tearing off his own, donned the regalia of the dead man. Then he hastened back
to the room in which he had been trapped, for there he had seen that which he
needed to make his disguise complete. In a cabinet he found them--pots of paint
that the old taxidermist had used to place the war-paint in its wide bands across
the cold faces of dead warriors.
A few moments later Gahan of Gathol emerged from the room a warrior of
Manator in every detail of harness, equipment, and ornamentation. He had
removed from the leather of the dead man the insignia of his house and rank so
that he might pass, with the least danger of arousing suspicion, as a common
warrior.
To search for Tara of Helium in the vast, dim labyrinth of the pits of O-Tar
seemed to the Gatholian a hopeless quest, foredoomed to failure. It would be
wiser to seek the streets of Manator where he might hope to learn first if she had
been recaptured and, if not, then he could return to the pits and pursue the hunt
for her. To find egress from the maze he must perforce travel a considerable
distance through the winding corridors and chambers, since he had no idea as to
the location or direction of any exit. In fact, he could not have retraced his steps a
hundred yards toward the point at which he and Tara had entered the gloomy
caverns, and so he set out in the hope that he might find by accident either Tara
of Helium or a way to the street level above.
For a time he passed room after room filled with the cunningly preserved dead of
Manator, many of which were piled in tiers after the manner that firewood is
corded, and as he moved through corridor and chamber he noticed hieroglyphics
painted upon the walls above every opening and at each fork or crossing of
corridors, until by observation he reached the conclusion that these indicated the
designations of passageways, so that one who understood them might travel
quickly and surely through the pits; but Turan did not understand them. Even
could he have read the language of Manator they might not materially have aided
one unfamiliar with the city; but he could not read them at all since, though there
is but one spoken language upon Barsoom, there are as many different written
languages as there are nations. One thing, however, soon became apparent to
him--the hieroglyphic of a corridor remained the same until the corridor ended.
It was not long before Turan realized from the distance that he had traveled that
the pits were part of a vast system undermining, possibly, the entire city. At least
he was convinced that he had passed beyond the precincts of the palace. The
corridors and chambers varied in appearance and architecture from time to time.
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