The Knife Dance
After two days, during which they were fed on water and dried fruit—a
variety that the Americans had never seen before—their captors entered
the prison, lifted them on to the backs of crickets, and marched them
along for hours through a vast underground world, lighted by a
phosphorescent glow, and teeming with crickets. The insects displayed
rare intelligence in the way they lived. They had traffic regulations,
certain paths of progress, large stacks of food guarded carefully by
armed crickets, and constantly added to and systematically given out,
playgrounds of peculiar construction, and places—or rather—spots
of—assemblage where they listened to each other chirp as if they were
singing.
The prisoners were hurried along so rapidly that they could see very
little of this life, and could only marvel at its strangeness.
Finally they came to a large underground palace. It was not a house
but Nature had built large pillars that extended upward several
hundred feet. They were composed of shining quartz interspersed with
uncut diamonds burned into the quartz by Nature.
As they entered through these portals they trod upon a yellow floor
that they soon discovered was panned gold dust.
At the entrance the crickets turned them over to a body guard of pigmy
men—fifteen in number. The pigmies cut the cords from around their
feet, and marched them into a large throne room with their spears
thrust against their sides and their hands tied behind their backs. At
the back end of the room was a throne ostentatiously ornamented with
gold and glittering jewels. Seated side by side on the throne were
Toplinsky and Queen Carza.
“Ah, ha, ho, ho, we meet again.” The giant looked at Joan with a glare
that caused her to shrink backward. “My statuesque blonde, again, but
I fear that I cannot offer her very great inducement at present. You
are invited to take part in the ceremonies that will make me king of
the moon, and join me in power with this lovely queen. Kneel to her!”
The last was whipped out like a lash, and Joan dropped thoughtlessly
on her knees, frightened at the giant’s tone of voice. The other three
prisoners, however, stood firmly erect.
“I kneel to God only,” Epworth declared vigorously. “If you wish to
take up with a female murderess that is your business, but we are
Americans.”
Queen Carza’s slothful eyes glittered ominously.
“The first part of the program,” she remarked as if Epworth had not
spoken, “will consist of a dance by the beautiful and accomplished
Moawha, formerly queen of the Selinites but now a mere dancing slave.
When the dance is finished we will eat some delicate fruit gathered
from the groves of her Land, and then—ah, then, my dear, I will have
your feet, and the feet of these other prisoners, thrust into that
smouldering fire.”
She pointed at a small stream of lava that spluttered softly over the
rocky bottom of the cavern, and flowed gently into a deep hole.
Joan dropped her head to repress a cry of alarm. Was this woman an
incarnate fiend that she loved to torture unto death innocent girls?
“Ah, ha! We win,” Toplinsky exclaimed as if in great admiration. “A
fit mate for the greatest scientist of the earth-world. We shall get
along admirably. But for the benefit of you Americans, who are going
to die presently—all of you except Joan whose death I shall endeavor
to have shifted to some remote period—I will say that Queen Carza and
I have some great plans ahead. Already I have discovered that her
people are gifted and know much science. True they do not live here
but we will soon be at home with them. Then we shall first conquer the
moon. I understand that there are about two million pigmies who give
allegiance to Moawha. We will capture them, and make slaves of them
although Carza has only an army of fifty thousand soldiers. To capture
them will be easy with Moawha dead, and my knowledge of gunpowder and
gas. When we have destroyed them and gained complete control over
crickets and pigmies I shall turn my attention to Capitalistic
America. I have always hated that country, and shall wipe it out.
First I will land my exploding projectiles on the City of New York.
Ah, ha, ho, ho!”
He paused and sneered evilly at Epworth, and the American felt a cold
chill pass over him. As a power for evil he admitted that Toplinsky
could be monstrous.
“Ah, ha, I laugh loudly! I roar with genuine amusement! I wring my
hands together with great pleasure! I see consternation and terrible
disaster sweep over fair America. Secure in my moon kingdom I shoot
deliberately, quietly, when I will, and I direct my projectiles by
radio. When I say unto myself ‘today I shall wipe out Chicago,’ that
day I will do it; when I look in the glass at the faces of myself and
my beloved queen and point at the map where there is now the City of
St. Louis, and say, ‘I will make a huge telescope and tomorrow week
you may watch that City and see it go up in smoke.’ Ah ha, it is so.
I, Herman Toplinsky, the greatest man that ever lived, have said, and
what I have said I have said.”
“Let the dance proceed,” Queen Carza commanded, placing her little
copper hand affectionately on the giant’s enormous hand, and dropping
her head into his lap. “I would see her dance the ‘Knife Dance’ for
the last time. I hear that the beautiful blond queen is the most
graceful dancer in our world. I wish to discover if this is true. If
she proves extraordinarily artistic I may conclude to dance with
her—or rather against her.”
Epworth and Joan glanced at each other.
“She is quite capricious,” Joan observed in a low voice.
“And as deadly as a rattlesnake.”
“I prefer the snake,” Billy put in. “In fact, I think you basely
slander the reptile.”
Moawha’s bonds were removed, a number of crickets and pigmy soldiers
moved up around her, cleared a space before the throne, and encircled
the space. Before she began the dance she was handed a long, sharp
two-edged knife. The blade was ten or twelve inches.
“I’d like to get hold of that knife,” Billy remarked whimsically in a
low voice.
Moawha flashed upon him an expressive glance, and then began her
pirouette mazes. With her long blond hair sweeping around her like a
cloak, she soon demonstrated that if she had a moon-wide reputation as
a dancer she could maintain it. It was a strange, wonderful, weird,
mystical terpsichorean exhibition during which she brandished the
knife she held in a seemingly reckless manner. Up to the throne, back
again, across the chamber, and each time that she neared the throne
her lithe form twisted gracefully, somersaulted over the knife held in
a dangerous manner, and the knife flashed wickedly toward the queen.
“Ah, it is so,” Toplinsky suddenly burst out. “Me-thinks that Queen
Carza is wise in watching this dance from an elevated platform. If the
fair blond came close enough I have an idea that her life would be a
short one, if not merry.”
He had scarcely finished his remark when Moawha darted backward,
flipped over with an athletic whirl, dropped down behind Billy’s back,
and whirled away.
But she had done much with that dexterous movement. Her keen knife had
slashed the bonds that bound Billy.
“Keep your hands behind your back,” she whispered to him. “Let them
appear tied.”
Before Toplinsky or the queen discovered her intention she made
another dexterous whirl, turned a somersault over Epworth’s head,
landed behind him and freed his hands. The next second she was
whirling away toward the throne. But this time she was a little too
slow. Toplinsky, who was quite observant, caught her freeing Epworth.
“Ah, ha, the little blond is——”
Like a cannon ball Epworth shot across the chamber, and landed in
front of Queen Carza.
“Call them off!” he hissed, seizing the queen by the arm with a
fierce, painful clutch. “Call them off, Toplinsky, or this lady is
going to be hurt.”
There was need of rapid action. Urged by the pigmy officers the
crickets were jumping forward directly at Billy and Joan. Billy pulled
his knife, and with one sweep cut the cords around Joan’s wrists.
“Use your tear gun!” Epworth called out. “Joan, you still have it in
your belt.”
Joan remembered the gun, and acted. With a single motion she swept a
circle around her.
“Get my automatic,” she whispered to Billy. “This promises to be
interesting. It is also in my belt.”
“Tell the queen to order them back,” Epworth again commanded.
There was no mistaking his intention. Toplinsky had previously braved
the American’s gun, and he responded to the threat. The queen obeyed
him, and the crickets slowly drew back as Queen Carza chirped at them.
Toplinsky made a move even in the face of Epworth’s threat.
“Slow down, Toplinsky!” Epworth growled. “Not a move or your
snake-like queen is going to begin to cry out loud.”
Toplinsky sneered a little. By this time he had regained his
composure, and was preparing to leap on Epworth. When he noticed the
glare in the young American’s eyes he slumped back. Epworth did not
realize it but many thoughts were racing through the giant’s mind.
Suppose Epworth should strangle the queen? He shivered. He really did
not think that Epworth would commit such an act but if he did he would
be in more danger than Epworth and his friends. With Queen Carza to
aid him he would soon be in complete control of the moon-world;
without her the crickets and pigmies would kill him instantly. He had
lorded it over them quite harshly during the few days he had been at
liberty and in power, and he had escaped death at their hands only
recently. Now he realized that the crickets and pigmies did not like
him. He had ruthlessly killed too many of them. True they did not
understand what death was but they knew enough to realize that this
big giant did not hesitate to wipe them out.
“Go easy, Epworth,” he said soberly. “You are standing on dynamite.
Perhaps we can ar——”
He was temporizing, preparing for a treacherous attack, and Epworth
knew it.
“I am going easy as long as you keep off your dogs of war but you are
not going to act funny.”
“So far so good,” Billy called out, “but where are we going—and how?”
It was a problem. For the moment they seemed to be on top—they had
their enemies tied. But this could not last. They were still in the
center of the great Crater Agrippa, buried alive amid thousands of
crickets that would eat them if they got a chance, with every avenue
of escape seemingly closed, and long, dark, terrifying tunnels between
them and the open air.
Joan breathed a breath of despair. Escape seemed impossible. They
could not march the queen through phalanx after phalanx of armed
crickets and intelligent pigmy men. Any second a number could sneak up
in their rear, or drop upon them out of one of the dark holes over
their heads. Yet this seemed to be the only way out.
But in what direction was _out_?
Epworth was asking himself that question fearfully. There were four
directions, and innumerable caverns penetrating the lighted chambers.
Only one of these passageways would lead back to their gliders.
He looked around at the frowning spear-tubes of the crickets
apprehensively.