“What’s this all about?” Neal asked. “Where are we?”
“We’re in the city my father discovered,” she answered. “It’s underground. A whole tribe of people — offshoots of some highly cultivated desert group — built it as a retreat against their more savage neighbors centuries ago. Here they have progressed amazingly well along certain lines, in electricity for instance, but in other fields they are childishly ignorant.
“Zaraf knew my father years ago and knew that he made this discovery. So his offer to help me was because he wanted access to this city for purposes of exploitation. We arrived here just a few days ahead of you, but fortunately for Zaraf, an evil element of the natives has been planning a revolution against the established ruling system. Being an opportunist Zaraf jumped right in with the revolters and helped them overthrow their ruler.”
“And that makes him ace-high with the new management,” Neal said reflectively.
Jane nodded.
“He told me all his plans the day after he kidnaped me and left you stranded in the desert. He was sure you were out of the picture forever. He intends to work himself into a position of power, regiment these natives, sell their produce and electrical equipment to the highest bidders. He must be stopped, Neal, he must. These natives are, for the most part, simple and kindly, but they’re easily influenced by white people because they worshipped my father. He was very kind and good to them during the years he stayed here, and Zaraf is trading on that.”
“Our big job,” Neal said, “is to get out of here as fast as we can. Do you have any idea of the size of this place? Or where we are now in relation to the nearest exit?”
Jane shook her head.
“I’m completely lost,” she confessed. “I know, however, that we are in one of the larger sleeping sections now. Everyone is up at the throne hall at this time to hear the new instructions from the new ruler. His name is Horjak. That’s why it was safe to bring you here through the halls. All the rooms are deserted now. Most of the natives here aren’t sympathetic with the new regime, but they are helpless because they have no leader or weapons.”
Neal started to speak but a shrill terrified shriek from beyond the door interrupted him. It was followed instantly by a loud banging on the panels.
Neal heard a harsh voice snapping commands and he knew that Zaraf was outside.
Jane was clinging to his arm desperately.
“You’ve got to get out of here, darling,” she cried.
This was the grim truth, Neal admitted, but there was no other exit from the room. He disengaged Jane’s frantic grip on his arm and shoved her into a corner, just as the door crashed inword.
Three small, but heavily muscled men, with the same pallid expression and lusterless hair of the young native girl, spilled into the room. They wore crimson tunics that dropped to the middle of their thighs and sandals with soft spongy soles. They sprang at Neal with a concerted ferocity that amazed him. The first soldier went down under a sledge hammer right hook that carried all of Neal’s heavy shoulder behind it. But before he could swing again the other two grabbed his arms. More of the crimson-tuniced guards poured into the room and the struggle was over. Panting, he was dragged from the room into the corridor to face the coldy sneering presence of Max Zaraf.
“I gave you your chance,” Zaraf snapped. “You refused it. Now you can accept your alternate choice.” He motioned imperiously to the guards. “To the throne room. Quickly!”
Before the guards could move to obey his order Jane rushed into the corridor and blocked their path with outstretched hands.
“You can’t do this,” she cried to Zaraf. “I won’t let you.”
Zaraf smiled at her, cynically.
“Since you are so perturbed as to his fate,” he said silkily, “I think it would be interesting if you would witness the execution yourself. There’s nothing like the presence of a lovely woman to inspire a man to die a hero’s death.” He nodded to two of the guards. “Take her along.”
The husky, crimson-tuniced guards sprang to obey, and after a brief, unequal struggle, the girl was carried away after Neal.
The throne room was a vast hall lined with tier upon tier of seats extending up to the highest reaches of the amphitheater. In the center of the throne room a huge unadorned dias was erected and on it sprawled a corpulent figure with an overly large head and dense stupid features.
Neal saw all this in one quick glance as he was shoved through a lower tier aisle and led to the large oval enclosure that faced the throne. The entire hall was brilliantly illuminated by the same sort of indirect lighting he had noticed before. Standing next to the figure on the throne was Max Zaraf, a gloating smile of anticipation on his face.
The throne room was quiet, but the tiers of seats were jammed with the native population of the underground city. Neal noticed the silence particularly. It was the brooding silence of a death block before an execution.
Zaraf bowed slightly to the figure on the dias and stepped down to face Neal.
“Very shortly,” he said, “you are going to die in a quite spectacular manner. You are a fool and you deserve it. These people are incredibly brilliant in many things, many things which the outside world will pay steeply for. Their invisibility screen with which they surround their central pyramid is one instance. Your pistol shot accidentally disrupted the force field and thus you accidentally stumbled onto the pyramid.
“The blue death, which they can send for fifty feet or fifty miles is one of the most destructive weapons the world will ever know. In your case they used a light charge which knocked you out, but they can use it to wipe out whole cities.
“Things like that are more valuable than diamonds in the world today. With clever exploitation who knows how far I can go?” Zaraf smiled and there was a sinister ugliness in the effort. “You, however, Mr. Meddler are not going any farther at all. At my demand Horjak, the new ruler, has ordered your execution. It will be followed by wholesale executions of those who oppose the reign of Horjak.”
“A very nice set-up,” Neal said quietly. “Those you don’t approve of, or who don’t approve of you, just get wiped out. It may work, Zaraf, but you’ll find living with yourself quite a job.”
“I can stand it, I think,” Zaraf chuckled mirthlessly. “Now to get down to business. My real reason in coming down here was to point out the highly ingenious method I have selected for your elimination.”
He pointed to a rack-like affair that was raised from the floor six or seven feet.
“In words of one syllable,” Zaraf continued with relish, “you will be spread-eagled there, tied hand and foot to each of the four posts. Then at a signal from me, the executioner cuts a very slender cord and the most amazing thing happens.”
He pointed up to the right and left of the rack, and Neal saw for the first time that a half dozen huge knives were suspended by ropes from the ceiling, parallel to the rack.
“The knives swing down,” Zaraf said softly. “They are heavy and will travel very fast. They will pass through your suspended body and that will be that! Your wrists and ankles will still be attached to the posts but the rest of your body will be sliced as neatly as a sausage. Clever, isn’t it?”
In Spite of himself, Neal felt a horrible revulsion crawling over him. To die was one thing. But to die like a butchered hog in front of a howling mob of savages was quite another.
His eyes circled the arena desperately. Every exit was guarded with a dozen men, every aisle clogged with spectators. His gaze swung back to Zaraf and he used every ounce of will power in his control to force a smile over his features.
“Am I supposed to be frightened?” he asked softly. “Am I supposed to be trembling and begging for mercy now? Sorry to disappoint you, Zaraf, but it doesn’t worry me that much.”