"This is for our getaway," he whispered, as he drew the bolt. I knew from the direction we had come that the door opened out onto the street.
He turned and moved diagonally across the room again to the opposite wall. Here he found another door which he opened with the utmost caution. When it was opened, the murmur of voices became more distinct. Ahead of us, I could see a tiny ray of dim light coming apparently from the floor of the room. My guide led me forward to it, and I saw that it came through a hole in the flooring—possibly a knothole.
"Look!" he whispered.
As I had to lie down on my stomach to look through the hole, I made him lie down, also. In the circumscribed range of my vision, I could not see much of the room below; but what I did see was almost enough. Two men were sitting at a table, talking—one of them was Muso. I could see no girl, but I knew that she might be there outside the little circle that was visible to me. I could hear the men talking.
"You don't really intend killing her, do you?" asked Muso's companion.
"If I don't get a favorable reply from Taman before the 2nd hour, I most certainly shall," replied Muso. "If she would write her father as I have asked her to, she would be free to go at once; for I know that Taman would not see his daughter die if she herself begged him to save her."
"You'd better do it, Nna," said the other man. "The time is getting short."
"Never!" said a girl's voice, and I knew that I had found Nna.
"You may go now," I whispered to my companion. "You will find your pistol on the ledge of the incinerator. But wait! How can I get into that room?"
"There is a trap door in the corner, to your right," he replied. He moved away so silently that I did not hear him go, but I knew that he had. Only a fool would have remained with me.
Faintly into the darkness of the room came a suggestion of growing light. The sun was rising. The first hour had come. In forty minutes of Earth time the second hour would strike—strike the death knell of Nna, the daughter of Taman .
Chapter 18—A Tanjong
Forty minutes! What could I do in that time to ensure the safety of the princess? Had I found her only a little sooner, I could have summoned soldiers and surrounded the building. They would not have killed her had they known they were going to be taken. But I must do something. The precious minutes were slipping by. There was nothing for it but to take the bull by the horns and do the best I could. I rose and felt my way to the corner of the room. On hands and knees I groped about in the darkness for the trap door, and at last I found it. Gingerly I tried it to learn if it were locked from below. It was not. I raised it quickly and jumped through, my pistol still in my hand. I heard it slam shut above my head as I touched the floor. Luckily, I did not fall; and my advent had been so sudden and so unexpected that for an instant Muso and his companion seemed unable to move or speak. I backed to the wall and covered them.
"Don't move," I warned, "or I'll kill you both."
It was then that I first saw two men in the far corner of the dimly lighted room as they leaped to their feet from a pile of rags upon which they had been lying asleep. As they reached for their pistols I opened fire on them. Muso dropped to the floor behind the table at which he had been sitting, but his companion now drew his own weapon and levelled it at me. I shot him first. How all three of them could have missed me in that small room I cannot understand. Perhaps the brains of two of them were dulled by sleep, and the other was unquestionably nervous. I had seen his hand shake as it held his weapon; but miss me they did, and the second and third went down before they could find me with the deadly stream of r-rays from their guns. Only Muso remained. I ordered him out from under the table and took his pistol from him; then I looked about for Nna. She was sitting on a bench at the far side of the room.
"Have they harmed you in any way, Nna?" I asked.
"No; but who are you? Do you come from my father, the jong? Are you a friend or another enemy?"
"I am your friend," I said. "I have come to take you away from here and back to the palace. She did not recognize me in my black wig and mean apparel.
"Who are you?" demanded Muso, "and what are you going to do to me?"
"I am going to kill you, Muso," I said. "I have hoped for this chance, but never expected to get it."
"Why do you want to kill me? I haven't harmed the princess. I was only trying to frighten Taman into giving me back the throne that belongs to me."
"You lie, Muso," I said; "but it is not this thing alone that I am going to kill you for—not something that you may say you did not intend doing, but something you did."
"What did I ever do to you? I never saw you before."
"Oh, yes you have. You sent me to Amlot to my death, as you hoped; and you tried to steal my woman from me."
His eyes went wide and his jaw dropped. "Carson of Venus!" he gasped.
"Yes, Carson of Venus—who took your throne away from you and is now going to take your life, but not because of what you did to him. I could forgive that, Muso; but I can't forgive the suffering you caused my princess. It is for that that you are about to die."
"You wouldn't shoot me down in cold blood?" he cried.
"I should," I said, "but I am not going to. We'll fight with swords. Draw!"
I had laid his pistol on the bench beside Nna, and now I drew my own and placed it on the table at which Muso had been sitting; then we faced one another. Muso was no mean swordsman, and as our blades shattered the silence of that little room I commenced to suspect that I might have bitten off more than I could chew; so I fought warily and, I am free to admit, mostly on the defensive. That is no way to win any contest, but I knew that if I became too reckless in my attack he might easily slip cold steel through me. Yet something must be done. This could not go on like this forever. I redoubled my efforts; and because I had by now become accustomed to his mode of attack, which he seldom varied, I commenced to have the advantage. He realized it, too; and the yellow in him showed up immediately. Then I pressed my advantage. I backed him around the room, certain now that I could run him through almost at will. He stepped back against the table in what I took to be a last stand; then, suddenly, he hurled his sword directly in my face; and almost simultaneously I heard the br-r-r of an r-ray pistol. I had seen him reach for mine just as he hurled his sword at me. I expected to fall dead, but I did not. Instead, Muso slumped backward across the table and then rolled off onto the floor; and as I looked around, I saw Nna standing with Muso's pistol still leveled in her hand. She had robbed me of my revenge, but she had saved my life.
As I looked at her, she sat down very suddenly and burst into tears. She was just a little girl and she had been through too much in the past few hours. She soon regained control of herself, however; and looked up and smiled at me, rather wanly.
"I really didn't know you," she said, "until Muso called you by name; then I knew that I was safe—that is, safer. We are not safe yet. His men were to return here at the 2nd hour. It must be almost that now."
"It is, and we must get out of here," I said. "Come!"
I slipped my pistol back into its holster; and we stepped to the ladder that led up to the trap door, and at the same moment we heard the heavy tramp of feet in the building above us. We were too late.
"They have come!" whispered Nna. "What are we to do?"
"Go back to your bench and sit down," I said. "I think one man may hold this doorway against many."