In the Chamber of Horrors
“It—it—is a chamber of horrors,” Joan gasped. “I know there is a ghost
in this place or some living thing. I can feel it; I can hear a slight
movement.”
Epworth strained his eyes in every direction. All was murky darkness,
Cimmerian gloom. If there was anything living near, the darkness
wrapped it in an envelop impossible to penetrate.
“You are certainly mistaken,” he soothed. “There is no living thing
here. It couldn’t——”
He paused. There came the suspicion of a sound to his ear. It was very
soft. A rat could not move with less noise; a cat in stepping would
have sounded like a cannon exploding. What could it be? Noiseless
crickets—a nest of young crickets expecting a mother? The cavern
seemed large and the air seemed pure but that animals or things could
live in such a place seemed impossible. He voiced his thoughts.
“It is strange that there is air in here,” Joan admitted, “and
stranger yet that I should think that there is life here. But this is
a strange world. We never saw a Thing on earth like these moon
crickets. Nor is there a pigmy on earth like the pigmies that rode on
the crickets; nor are there great hollows in the earth where the air
has congealed and left the outside cold and airless. It is a different
creation entirely. Mercy! I see—I see—eyes staring at me from out the
darkness. Holy angels, protect me! There are three of them, and they
are running me crazy to look at them.”
Her teeth chattered until Epworth could hear them, and she buried her
head in the young man’s shirt front. Now he also saw the eyes. There
were three—great red lights that flared in the darkness. Two on a
level, and one in the center. The center eye was enormous and
terrifying to the extreme. Brave as he was he shivered with terror.
There was something so ghostly, uncanny, about the Thing that his
nerves washed out.
Then it flashed by. A nasty-smelling Thing shot out of the gloom; a
Thing with a lizard-like, scaly body, long legs and antennas; a Thing
that carried a phosphorus glow that plainly disclosed its proportions.
It went by them like a railroad train, an enormous whirling, gliding
animal that chilled them unto death.
Joan screamed at the top of her voice, and fell limp. Epworth stumbled
and fell forward on his face. Each second they expected the Thing to
pounce on them, and mash them flat.
Then oblivion fell on both.
It seemed hours later that the two returned to consciousness. They
were on the same level, rocky floor, lying side by side, and Epworth
was holding his gun in his hand. It had not been discharged.
When he made this discovery he rose quickly to his feet. His first
thought was of the evil-smelling Thing that had appeared out of the
darkness. Where was it? Were there others back in this chamber of
horrors? Was the one he saw preparing another attack on them?
He looked around with fearful eyes. He could not see any signs of the
animal. That did not mean that it was not near. He thought that the
Thing could move with less noise than a cat, and with the swiftness of
an eel.
“W-w-what was it?” Joan stammered.
“I hope to high heaven I never find out,” Epworth breathed fervently.
“It was the most gosh-awful horror that ever stirred my nerves. It has
probably crawled back in its hole, which must be down this chamber. I
hope it dies before I see it again. At least I am going to go in the
direction directly opposite from that taken by the Thing—and I am
going as fast as my slow feet will let me.”
He sprang up, caught her hand, and ran hurriedly down the chamber,
stumbling over big rocks, and against the sides of the tunnel in his
desperate effort to leave the spot.
He had no idea where he was going. For all he knew he was going back
the way he came. He was getting away from that chamber of horrors as
speedily as possible.
They wandered on for an hour—two hours. There was no end to the dark
tunnel but they were moving and getting farther and farther away from
that hidden monster; and they were going swiftly, without thinking of
falling into another chasm. In fact any kind of a hole would have been
preferable to this, and they dared not stop.
Finally Joan looked ahead and saw a streak of light.
“Thank heavens,” she breathed. “At last we are coming to the end of
this horrible tunnel.”
Epworth did not reply. He was not so sure. On the contrary he could
not, by his greatest scientific legerdemain, figure how they would
ever get out of this crater.
The end came abruptly—butting up against a pile of large stones. There
were large cracks between the stones, and it was patent that
intelligent hands had placed them and not Nature. Some being or some
intelligent Thing had blocked up the passage purposely with loose
stones, to keep out the enormous reptiles.
But the light was streaming through the cracks, and the two were crazy
to get to light again. If this darkness enveloped them many hours
longer they would lose their minds. Both fell on the rocks with one
thought, and began to tear them aside.
When a crack large enough to see through was made they drew back
dismayed. The walls of the chamber ahead were lighted by a stream of
fiery lava, and there seemed no prospect of escaping from their cavern
prison. However the dim light was preferable to the intense gloom that
pervaded the passage they were in, and Epworth decided to dig in.
He attempted to survey the interior of the other chamber but his view
was shut off by the narrowness of the opening, and again he fell to
removing the loose stones. Soon he had an opening large enough to push
through.
When they stepped into the chamber their hearts jumped with surprise.
Billy Sand and Herman Toplinsky were lying on the floor near where
they entered with their hands bound, and their faces against the
floor. On a stone couch near them was a beautiful little woman, no
larger than a ten-year old girl. She was splendidly formed, and her
blonde hair was wrapped around her body in a braid and fell almost to
her feet. She also was bound hand and foot.
With a leap Epworth was by Billy’s side, slashing the cords that bound
him. When Billy was free Epworth released Toplinsky and the girl on
the couch in the same manner. When freed Toplinsky sat up lazily and
stretched his arms and legs.
“Ah, ha, the beautiful Joan—the lady who hates me,” he greeted
amiably. “Pleased to meet you—truly am—but before we make merry let us
hurriedly get away by the passage through which you entered. I fear
that we have very little time to lose. In fact——”
He was interrupted by a noise at the far end of the chamber. Glancing
in the direction they saw a large stone rolled away, and thirty
crickets, marching in military formation, came in, stepping carefully
over the stream of lava. They carried sharp steel-pronged spears, and
it was apparent that their intentions were not friendly.
They were led by five men and a woman. And such a woman! Like the
blonde girl on the couch she was no larger than a ten-year old child
but she was bewilderingly beautiful although her flesh was copper
colored. Her hair, a deep blue black, was twisted around her waist
over a richly colored red breech cloth. Otherwise she was naked. Her
eyes, slightly oblique, were slothful at times and at other times full
of fire, transforming her into a menacing dictator. She was ornamented
like a barbarous queen with bracelets on her arms, and a crown of
jewels on her head.
The men who led the crickets were also copper colored, and small in
stature, well-formed except their heads, which were just a trifle
large for their bodies. When Joan looked into their faces she closed
her eyes. The lines of the faces were badly wrinkled, the mouths were
contorted and there was a smirk of evil stamped over them. That they
were highly intelligent, however, she was soon to learn.
The woman, whose head was better formed, spoke, to their surprise, in
broken English with a peculiar pronunciation that caused them to bend
their ears attentively to comprehend.
“I am Carza, the queen of the moon.” She drew her form proudly erect
and stared arrogantly at the little blonde girl on the couch. “You are
aware of that now, Moawha,” she continued addressing the girl. “From
this on you are my slave. Perhaps, a little later I shall slay you,
and be rid of your pretensions forever.”
She paused, shrugged her shoulders, and smiled softly. It was not an
angelic expression but it exhibited her even, white teeth, and proved
exceedingly attractive to Toplinsky, and the others thought that she
was quite exquisite.
“You are earth men.” She turned imperiously to Toplinsky. “You are
wondering how I am able to speak to you in your own language? It is
simple. For years our scientists have been getting peculiar words out
of the air, and recording them on their space records. For a long time
they could make little out of the noises from space but in time they
concluded that they were hearing the people on the great world around
which our smaller planet revolves every twenty-eight days. Were they
correct in their surmise?”
She looked inquiringly at Toplinsky. He nodded in the affirmative, and
with the grace of a courtier.
“Ah, ha, it is so, your most gracious majesty. We are charmed to meet
a lady of such distinction.”
Carza knitted her eyebrows slightly, and then smiled sweetly at the
giant.
“So they put their intellects to work, and gradually worked out an
understanding of things that you call earthly as well as an ability to
talk in your language.”
“Wonderful! Wonderful!” Toplinsky added. “Did they also discover a way
of sending to the earth?”
She shook her head.
“Our instruments, it seemed, are not of a character that will put us
into direct communication. We can hear but not send. However I do not
understand how you gained your liberty. I was told that you were bound
hand and foot, and that my people only waited word from me to slay
you.”
One of the copper leaders approached deferentially, dropped to his
knees, and began to speak to her in an unknown tongue.
“So, so,” she mused when he had completed his explanation, “there were
only two men and Moawha when you were left here as prisoners, and you
have been hatching a man and woman.” She smiled artfully, and the
smile was more disagreeable than a threat. “Some of your friends have
been able to follow and have broken in to help you escape. Seize
them!”
She thundered the command shrilly, and drew back to lean against the
wall. The copper men, followed by the crickets, sprang forward giving
the cricket chirp of command.
“Keep them off!” Epworth commanded harshly. “They must not undertake
to touch us.”
“Must not,” sneered Queen Garza. “A bold word, Sir Earth Man. We shall
see. Have at them, Noble Tauran.”
The copper men and the crickets rushed in a body. Epworth knocked down
the leader with the butt of his gun, and Toplinsky, seizing a large
cricket by its rear legs, swung the insect around his head, and
charged, knocking the copper men and crickets around like marbles.
Queen Carza leaned negligently against the wall, and dropped her chin
nonchalantly into the palm of her hand. These men had been reported to
her to be great fighters, and she loved fighters. She watched with
keen interest. Frequently she nodded her head as if well satisfied.
Joan could not understand this satisfaction. The crickets and the
pigmy men were obviously unable to do harm to the three earthmen. But
the queen was only waiting. When she discovered that her body guard
was facing inevitable defeat she chirped through her teeth.
It was the musical chirp of the crickets, calling them to battle. They
came, swarming through the door and surrounding Toplinsky and the two
Americans like locusts. Billy, because of his small stature (he was
only five five) went down quickly; Epworth fought aggressively for
several moments but his long, fast and strenuous efforts in the cave
without water had weakened him temporarily, and finally he gave way,
his feet slipped, and a hundred crickets had him pinned to the floor.
“Ah, ha, ho, ho! The bantam fighter is down,” Toplinsky roared with a
laugh that sounded like a fiend. “It is sad indeed. Some day we will
renew that interesting contest for Lady Joan’s favor. At present
however——”
He backed against the wall, and began to use his arms like a windmill,
pushing the crickets and pigmies around like chaff. It seemed to the
onlookers as if flesh and blood could not battle in this manner. With
his pale blue eyes flashing fire, his long, shaggy hair whirled back
over the crown of his head, and his heavy red beard twisting from
right to left with each movement of his head, he looked like a fiend.
Epworth, Joan and Billy, and the girl called Moawha, by the queen,
were bound and placed with their backs to the wall, and still
Toplinsky fought. If his strength held out it seemed as if he would be
able to stand off a nation of crickets.
“Hold!”
The command came from the queen, and was accompanied by a cricket
chirp. Instantly her cohorts ceased fighting, and Toplinsky, smiling
as if in the face of death, extended his hand, jerked a toga off of
one of the pigmies, and wiped the blood from his forehead where he had
been hit by a spear.
Pushing aside the crickets and soldiers Carza strode fearlessly up to
the giant, and stopped to gaze into his face fascinated.
“You are a great fighter,” she said abruptly.
“I am,” Toplinsky agreed without modesty. “I am the greatest fighter
you ever saw, or ever will see.”
“Bend your head,” she commanded.
With a smile that displayed his huge teeth disagreeably Toplinsky
obeyed. The queen took the cloth from his hands, cleaned the blood
from his face, and thrust the bloody rag into her waist band.
“I have been looking for a man of mighty valor—a man like you. Yes,
you have been the search of my life. Come! Together we will go far.
You will aid me in destroying my enemies, and increase my power over
the whole world.”
“But how about me?” Toplinsky objected. “What do I get?”
“You will become the husband of the queen, and if I find that I love
you as I think I shall, you will become the leader above me.”
Toplinsky picked her up in his left hand, kissed her, and put her back
on the floor.
“It shall be as you say.”
“If you take that woman for your queen you must slay thousands of
innocent people,” Moawha broke out passionately. “They are gentle,
kind-hearted, and constantly warred upon by these abominable
crickets—who eat them.”
Moawha also spoke in broken English but her words were not as clear as
those pronounced by the queen.
“I shall have your feet toasted in that nice little stream of fire,”
Carza said coldly, turning malevolently on Moawha. “You are not
interested in this.”
Her black eyes were flashing fiercely as she spoke but they cleared
instantly when she turned to Toplinsky.
“Yes, it pleases me. I shall make you king.”
“Ho, comrades!” Toplinsky called out to the little men. “See that
these Americans do not escape. Also look after this strange little
woman. Presently we shall slay the two men but not the earth woman.
Ha! ha!”
He laughed uproariously.
“Be sure to guard Moawha well,” the queen commanded, recognizing as
official the authority Toplinsky was grasping. “She shall die during
the crowning ceremonies.”