Rick Brant - The Lost City Part 14

The Mongols had gone somewhere. They weren't on this side of the wall; likely the fork in the trail led to the other side, around the opposite end of the wall.

His searching eyes discovered a place where a rock had crumbled. He might be able to climb up at the spot where the barrier fitted into the mountainside.

He took the first steps, clinging precariously to broken rock. It could be done. He gritted his teeth and went on up. As he neared the top, something gave under his foot. He made a wild grab for the top and his fingers caught on the ledge. For a second he dangled, then his groping feet found new footholds and he lifted himself to the top of the barrier, pulled himself to the flat, wide surface and lay quietly, his heart pounding madly.

The barrier was ten feet wide at the top. He crawled to the opposite edge - and looked down into another city!

This was a living city, filled with people who were replicas of the Mongol warriors he had seen! It stretched out from the wall in row after row of buildings. A huge two-storied building of white stone was the central point on this side of the wall.

Beyond the buildings were gardens, and he caught a glimpse of sheep grazing. At the far side, near the mountain wall, rose a strange, flat-topped hill, a plateau of brown rock that was all of two hundred feet high. The huge table of rock dominated the part of the city next to the mountain wall.

Almost directly below him, a group of Mongols were cooking meat in a pot over live coals. He drew back, afraid of being seen, but no one looked up. At first he thought the entire city was populated by men, then he saw that a good half were women, dressed in the same loose trousers, the same padded coats the men wore.

Warriors strode by with long, curved knives tucked into their belts, and carrying bows. Once he saw a man with a hooded falcon on his wrist.

It was like a dream. Rick felt as though he were suspended halfway between earth and sky, looking down on history.

For long minutes, his fascinated gaze explored the teeming city, and then he stirred reluctantly and drew back from the edge of the wall. The professors and Scotty would have to know about this, if he could find them again.

In a few moments he was on the ground again, heading back to the valley entrance. He s.h.i.+vered a little now, because the sun was rapidly dropping out of sight, and the chill of dusk was setting in. Traveling with long, free strides, watching for a sign of the Mongols, he pa.s.sed through the dead city. The tunnel opening loomed and he hurried into it, then slowed his speed because it was very dark inside. His footsteps echoed and re-echoed, and suddenly the short hairs on his neck tightened as he sensed an alien presence in the cave. He stopped, holding his breath, and listened tensely.

That strange odor was in the air again, a mixture of leather and rancid b.u.t.ter. He turned slowly to look back the way he had come, and a shadow blocked the dim light from the valley entrance - a shadow that moved!

His heart came up into his throat and choked him. Moving with frightened caution, he felt his way to the wall of the tunnel. Was it imagination, or could he hear heavy breathing? His groping hand searched for the cold rock of the wall - and touched warm fles.h.!.+

Rick gave a wild yell and leaped forward, but something struck him from behind, just above the knees and he went down with a jarring thud.

He rolled over, clawing at the thing that held his legs in an iron grip, and his hand found coa.r.s.e, oily hair. He jerked, and the cave echoed with a cry of pain.

Clutching hands found his arms and pinioned them. Other hands lifted him to his feet. He was rushed back the way he had come, and pulled out of the cave into daylight once more.

Four Mongol warriors held him captive.

Rick looked into the greasy, Oriental faces with their black, animal-like eyes and knew he could expect no mercy.

"All right," he said. "You've got me." He forced his voice to a semblance of calmness. He did not want these evil little men to know how terrified he was.

They let go of his arms and stepped back, drawing curved knives from their leather harnesses. One of them motioned for him to start walking down the path. They fell in around him, two in front and two behind.

Rick walked slowly down the trail and turned to the right at a prod from one of the guards. They were taking him into the occupied part of the city.

Why hadn't he been more careful? They must have known he was coming, because they had lain in wait in the very niche where he had hidden from the first patrol. But how could they have known? If any of the Mongols had seen him in the dead city, or on the wall, surely they would have raised a cry.

And then there was no more time to wonder, because they rounded a corner of the barrier wall and stepped into the occupied city, and at the sight of him, Mongols came running, yelling to each other. In a moment, a crowd had gathered, hemming him in. An angry crowd, all talking and screaming at once.

Rick kept his head high, but there was cold fear within him. They were yelling for his blood. He could hear it in the shrill, angry voices, and see it in the fierce yellow faces.

The guards pushed their way through the mob, protecting him from hands that reached out to strike him. A foot at a time, shoving back the pressing Mongols, they marched him toward the white central building. The rancid, animal stench of the crowd made him feel sick. Sweat streamed down his face and into his eyes, but he didn't dare lift a hand to wipe it away.

Then, miraculously, it was quiet. They had gained the sanctuary of the big white building.

The guards led him into an enormous chamber of white, marblelike stone. They marched across the stone floor, their footsteps echoing from the walls.

At the far end of the chamber he saw a raised dais and a throne of gold and white, guarded by two Mongols who wore crested helmets and carried long spears.

His guards marched him to it, stood him directly before the throne, then stepped behind him.

"They're waiting for the boss to pa.s.s sentence on me," Rick thought. He had no doubt of what that sentence would be.

There was movement behind him. He half turned his head, and saw a Mongol in a yellow robe lighting the torches that stood in cressets along the walls.

Then, behind the throne, the curtains parted. Rick sensed that the Mongols behind him were prostrating themselves.

The man who came out from behind the throne was over six feet tall, gaunt as a skeleton, and the torchlight flickered and gleamed from a skull as barren and polished as yellow ivory. He was incredibly old. His face was a wrinkled saffron mask from which two eyes blazed, and his lips were a thin straight line.

Moving with majestic slowness, he mounted the throne, sat down, arranging the flowing green robes he wore. Then he sat immobile, unmoving and unblinking as a graven image.

Rick licked dry lips and lowered his gaze. He couldn't meet that piercing, unwinking stare.

From behind him, one of the Mongol guards came forward, bowing until his head almost touched the ground. He spoke in guttural syllables, not raising his eyes to the throne. When he finished, there was silence. To Rick, his own breathing sounded explosively loud.

Then the man on the throne spoke, a terse sentence, his eyes on Rick.

The Mongol guard bowed again. He backed away, took a torch from the wall and handed it to one of his fellows. He took Rick's arm roughly and thrust him toward a door that loomed black in the wall at the end of the room. They led him down a pa.s.sage carved from the rock itself. His heart almost stopped when the faint torchlight showed him grinning skulls set into niches in the rocky walls.

For a full two minutes they pushed on into the dark pa.s.sage, then they rounded a corner and he saw a faint glow of light. In a moment they walked into a high-ceilinged room that evidently had been a natural cave. He blinked in the sudden light of myriad torches, then as his eyes became accustomed to the glow, he let out a hoa.r.s.e cry.

There, in a barred niche on the opposite side, were three men. He pulled away from his guards and ran to them.

Scotty, Weiss, and Zircon!

For a heartbeat, the three stared at him and he at them, then Scotty broke the silence.

"Tough luck, kid. We were hoping they wouldn't get you."

Rick found his own voice. "But how ..."

"Later," Scotty said. "Better watch those gooks behind you."

Rick whirled. The knives were out again, and four pairs of eyes were on him, waiting for the slightest move toward escape. One of the guards went to the niche and pulled out the iron rods that held the door closed. He motioned Rick inside.

As Rick walked in to join his three friends, he tasted the bitterness of despair. With all four of them imprisoned, there would be no means of rescue. Hope was dead now.

The barred door clanged shut behind him. Two of the Mongols took up stations in the room outside, and the other two left.

"Are you all right, Rick?" Professor Weiss asked anxiously.

"Of course he is," Zircon tried to sound rea.s.suring.

Scotty put an arm around his shoulders. "How'd they get you?"

Rick outlined his story quickly, then asked, "What happened? I was hoping ..."

"That we were still free?" Zircon smiled grimly. "I wish we were. But we blundered right into their hands."

"It was that blasted yak," Scotty said unhappily. "We followed the trail you pointed out, and we got to the red rock, all right, then a hunk of rock fell and hit the yak and he got scared and ran, with us right after him. He got trapped in that little pocket right below the entrance."

"Scotty saw the opening in the rock," Julius Weiss added. "We decided to look into it. Pure curiosity."

"I wish I hadn't seen it," Scotty said. "We went in, and came out in the city. The professors were all excited, of course. I had a hunch we ought to beat it, but it seemed like too good a chance to miss, especially since the place looked deserted. We went down and found that golden tomb. Only, while we were prowling around, a bunch of those yellow monkeys came up behind us. They hit us like a charging backfield. I didn't even have a chance to get my rifle up and c.o.c.ked."

"They took us without a struggle," Zircon added. "Before we knew they were even there, they were swarming over us like ants."

"I think they saw us as we came through the tunnel," Julius Weiss said. "I'm sure they have had us under surveillance for days."

Rick looked at their prison. It was a corner of the cavernlike room, a network of iron bars rising from floor to ceiling and from wall to wall. There was no furniture.

"Now what?" he asked.

Before anyone had a chance to answer, Scotty held up his hand. "I hear footsteps. Someone's coming."

Instantly all of them were watching the dark opening across the room that marked the pa.s.sageway. Outside the barred cage, the guards came to attention, faces toward the pa.s.sage.

The footsteps echoed hollowly in the silence, the footsteps of only one man. Rick blinked his eyes a couple of times, because the uncertain torchlight made him sure he had seen something white, just beyond the rim of light.

Then the four of them gasped simultaneously as into the torchlit room, smiling, immaculate in white linens, a mentholated tissue to his nose, stepped Hendrick Van Groot!

CHAPTER XVI.

Conway Shows His Hand

IT WAS Van Groot who broke the shocked silence. He came across the room, leaned against the bars, and said cordially: "Gentlemen, I welcome you to the Valley of the Golden Tomb."

Zircon spoke first. "I'd enjoy getting my hands on you, my friend."

Van Groot smiled. "Please don't make the mistake of trying it, Professor Zircon. Subotai," indicating the younger of the two Mongol guards, "would be most happy to plant his knife between your ribs. In fact, you have me to thank that you weren't killed outright."

"Explain yourself," Weiss demanded harshly.

"Of course. You met Chepe-Noyan in the throne room. But for my intervention, he would have had you executed at once. However, I persuaded him that we must delay the happy moment for a while - until I had an opportunity to find out just how much you have discovered."

"About what?" Rick asked.

Van Groot chuckled. "Am I to gather that you have no idea why so many things have been happening to your expedition?"

"No idea," Weiss said tiredly. "I suppose it's too much to ask for an explanation ..."

"Not at all," Van Groot replied, smoothly. "Under the circ.u.mstances, I believe a partial explanation might amuse you."

Rick and his friends pressed close to the bars to hear what the man had to say.

Van Groot crumpled a tissue and tossed it aside. "You were unfortunate enough to enter the forbidden part of the city. Entering at all was bad enough, but coming through the Tomb area ..." He shrugged, "Chepe-Noyan was quite annoyed, and quite definite about your punishment."

"By the forbidden part," Zircon asked, "I take it that you mean the deserted part beyond the wall?"

"Exactly. When you entered that portion of the city, you violated the Tomb of the Genghis Khan!"

Rick's eyes widened. That was why the place had been deserted, why the golden spire dominated that entire part of the city. "That golden monument must be the tomb," Rick said.

"The Golden Tomb of the Great Khan," Van Groot agreed.

"That is ridiculous!" Weiss exploded. "Why, the Khan was buried in ... in ..." He stopped suddenly.

"You see?" Van Groot smiled. "The karned professor has just recalled that no one has ever discovered the burial place of the Khan. According to legend, he was buried in Shansu province, in China. Actually, one of his legions brought his body here and built this city. The people are descendants of his warriors. They guard his tomb against the day when he will return."

"But you," Zircon demanded. "How do you fit into all this?"

"You are," Van Groot chuckled, 'looking at the True Messenger of the Great Khan!"

The travelers stared.

"He's insane," Weiss muttered.

"Don't misunderstand," Van Groot said. "That is what they believe. I know better, of course. You see, I was in China some time ago and got into a bit of difficulty with the authorities. I had to leave in rather a hurry. I borrowed a Chinese military plane - without permission, of course - and started for the border of India. However, the gas tanks were not full."

He produced another tissue and sniffed delicately. "Very careless. I should have stolen one with full tanks. At any rate, I pa.s.sed over the city just as I was running out of fuel. It was a choice of cras.h.i.+ng or bailing out, so I decided to jump while near civilization, even though I didn't know the nature of the place. These people had never seen a plane before, much less a man in a parachute. I sized up the situation and it wasn't hard to convince them I was a messenger sent to tell of the Khan's second coming."

"Incredible," Zircon muttered.

"But quite true. I knew a smattering of the Mongol tongue, so it was a simple matter. I'm rather proud of my quick thinking. They accepted me without reservation. Now I can come and go as I please, and they take orders from me. I'm careful not to abuse my power, however. And I'm careful to show proper deference to the tomb whenever I come."

Rick asked a question even though he knew what the answer would be. "Is your real name Conway?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact." Van Groot smiled at him. "You got that name from Meekin, I presume? He never was very dependable. Witness his failures in such a simple matter as wrecking your equipment."

"That brings us to the crux of the matter," Zircon bellowed. "Why have you tried to block us at every step? You had our equipment stolen in Bombay and-"

Van Groot interrupted. "The matter might have ended there had it not been for your two eager young men and the Hindu boy. Your recovery of the equipment almost put a dent in my plans."

"How did you happen to have your hirelings at the dock waiting for us?" Weiss asked. "Surely you couldn't have known that Meekin had failed."