Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs (19 page)
Read Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs Online
Authors: Mike Resnick,Robert T. Garcia
I turned to Bal Daxus and nodded to him to open the portal all the way.
I was soon approaching the Throne Room with almost two hundred thousand men at my heels. Hin Abtol must have heard us from afar, for when I burst into the room I was greeted by a blast of fire from twenty radium rifles.
I dove to a side, but the vanguard of my forces was mowed down like sitting ducks. Hewing my way through a wall of the Jeddak’s loyal officers, I drove onward to the throne, where Hin Abtol sat ashen-faced, screaming unheeded commands.
Countless times my blade paused to still a Panar heart forever or quench its thirst in the throat of a new foe. I ceaselessly shouted taunts at my enemies, as is my wont in the heat of battle, and must have accounted for two dozen men before I had time for a quick glance at the door.
To my dismay, I saw that the pile of corpses was so high that none of my men could get past them. The dead were stacked literally from floor to ceiling.
I turned back at the throne: Hin Abtol was gone! My eyes fell on the red curtain behind the throne, and I knew that he could have retreated to no other place in so short a time. There was only one man standing in my way, and I recognized him immediately: it was Rab-zov.
With a single bound I was upon him. He had barely raised his sword to defend himself before his head rolled to the floor and I ran through the curtains.
There was a door, and this I opened and raced through. It led to another part of the catacombs, and far ahead I could see the figure of the cowardly Jeddak as he ran for his life.
Adventure’s End
I pursued Hin Abtol with great leaps and bounds that quickly lessened the distance between us. When the tyrant saw that escape was impossible, he drew his sword and turned to face me.
“Let us see,” I said, engaging him, “if you are as excellent a swordsman as you told your people you were when you returned from Horz with my stolen flier four years ago, and if you are brave enough to face me when my hands are not bound.”
He said nothing, but began fighting like a cornered ulsio. His terror increased his proficiency, and though I touched him a hundred times I could not deliver the fatal blow.
Suddenly there came to our ears a great cheer from the Throne Room.
“Did you hear that, Hin Abtol?” I said. “Your warriors have capitulated to your frozen army. Your empire is lost.”
My words struck home, and the arrogant tyrant’s mind snapped. He began chattering and gibbering like a lunatic, and tears rolled down his face even as he pressed on with his attack. He was a sorry figure, but I could feel no pity for a man who had destroyed so many innocent lives, and shortly I ran my sword through his putrid heart.
I returned to a scene of triumph and elation in the Throne Room. It was jammed with my men, and they gave me a rousing welcome. Tan Hadron soon appeared, and not long after that Bal Daxus returned. Both had been completely successful in their missions. Bal Daxus was weary and bloodied by a heroic charge that had saved the lives of a thousand of his men.
“Long live John Carter!” cried one of the warriors. “Long live John Carter, Jeddak of Ayathor!”
I raised my hand to still the cheering voices.
“Thank you, my comrades,” I said, “but the Jeddak of Ayathor should be one of your countrymen, and, as you may know, Pankor has had no Jeddak since the defeat of Hin Abtol three years ago. It, too, needs a firm and noble ruler. “Warriors!” I continued. “How sounds Bal Daxus, Jeddak of Pankor and Ayathor?”
The men who fought beside him quickly raised their swords, and soon every sword in the room was raised in boisterous approval. With that act the dwar who had chosen his honor ahead of his country became the Jeddak of the latter.
There was a wild victory celebration throughout Ayathor while the fliers were being made ready to transport those who wished to leave for the surface of the planet, and before I departed for Helium with Tan Hadron, I had the pleasure of attending the ceremony which forever united the new Jeddak with Lirai, who we had found greatly worried but quite safe in the room where we had left her.
Our homecoming to Helium was celebrated by a great festival at which Tan Hadron and I were the guests of honor. The entire world had given me up for dead, and the news of my return brought greetings and visits from jeds and jeddaks the world over.
Tars Tarkas, Jeddak of Thark and my greatest friend, was there to greet me, and there were tears of joy in the fierce green warrior’s eyes. Carthoris, Thuvan Dihn, Jeddak of Ptarth, Kulan Tith, Jeddak of Kaol, Talu, Xodar, Kantos Kan, Hor Vastus, and all my other comrades of peace and war were present, too, but I fear that I took little notice of them, for I was too busy enjoying the only honor I ever cared for: that of once again putting my arms around my incomparable Dejah Thoris.
His narrative ended, John Carter stood up and stretched his powerful frame.
“Did you enjoy my story?” he asked pleasantly.
“Oh, yes!” I exclaimed. “How long were you in Ayathor?”
“Unbelievable as it seemed to me, almost a year. I suppose most of it was spent in the Pits.”
“This must have happened many years ago,” I said. “What has taken place since then?”
“Many strange intrigues and adventures,” he replied. “Adventure and I seem to attract one another.”
“Could you tell me some more of your experiences?” I asked.
He looked out the window, across the silent Arizona desert.
“The sun will soon be rising over the hills,” he said at last, “and I must be gone.”
“Can’t you stay a little longer?” I pleaded.
He shook his head. “The woman I love and the planet that gave her to me are beckoning. I must return to them.”
“Will you come back someday?” I asked hopefully.
“Perhaps,” he half promised, the trace of a smile flickering about his lips. “Perhaps I will.”
And with that, he was gone.
Shoz-Dijiji encompasses the best of two worlds—a white man who was raised as an Apache. Burroughs knew this milieu, and one of us (Mike) thinks
The War Chief
is the best of ERB’s many novels. Ralph Roberts, publisher, editor, and author of more than 100 books and 4 screenplays, revisits Shoz-Dijiji and his lady love, Wichita Billings.
—Mike
Apache Lawman
Ralph Roberts
Geronimo Is Off the Reservation Again
Shoz-Dijiji, whose name meant “Black Bear” war chief of the
Be-don-ko-he
Apaches, son of Geronimo, fiercest of his fellow savage warriors, known as the dread Apache Devil, once implacable enemy of the white-eyes—the hated
pindah lickoyee
—labored mightily in pushing the errant calf up the side of the arroyo. The young calf had blundered into the depression and found it had not the ability to get out again. At the top of the bank, the mother cow watched anxiously.
With a last heave to its hindquarters, the panicked calf scrambled over the arroyo’s lip. Shooed away from danger by the mother cow, the little animal was receiving a welcoming licking from its parent as Shoz-Dijiji pulled himself back to level ground and stood.
Shoz-Dijiji, yet a young man, now looked nothing like the fierce warrior he had been until recently. He wore the garb of a cowboy—faded denim pants with chaps to ward against the thorns, an equally faded checked shirt, an old hat on his straight black hair, above a dark face with high cheekbones. From his belt hung a six-shooter and the hilt of a knife peeked from his right boot, a boot—like its brother to the left—unpolished and well-worn with dulled spurs attached. Even for an 1880s cowboy, he did not appear especially prosperous. For he was not. He had the clothes on his back, his weapons—for a warrior must always have weapons—and little more than that.
A smile of satisfaction came to his face as he watched the reunion of mother and daughter before him while lifting his hat and wiping sweat from his brow. There were small rewards to this new life of his. He had fallen for the white goddess Wichita Billings, his beloved Chita. Feeling that Usen, god of the Apache, had forsaken the Apache and their way of life, he had left them and accepted the offer of Chita to become foreman of the small ranch she inherited from her father.
Because of the slight sound of a horse approaching, Shoz-Dijiji whirled, ready for action. On a horse saddled only with a blanket sat an old Apache, scrawny, tired-looking, in need of a good meal, but dressed only in a single loincloth and headband, and clutching a small sack. Armed with a bow and flint-tipped arrows, he was Go-yat-thlay, called ‘Geronimo’ by the white-eyes. The old man looked little like the war chief of all the Apaches. He who had led the army of the Great White Father on a futile chase for years over an area of the Southwest the size of Europe. He who had finally concluded Usen, the Apache god, had deserted them and gave up, surrendering to those who could not catch him.
“Hello, Father,” Shoz-Dijiji said in their language. “Have you escaped the reservation again?”
The old man shrugged. “Geronimo return soon, must talk to son first.” He looked to where Shoz-Dijiji’s horse grazed. “You grow careless now that war is over. I could have stolen horse.”
Shoz-Dijiji smiled. “And I could have tracked you to Mexico and taken the horse back one dark night.”
Geronimo nodded, pleased. “You learned well, war chief of the
Be-don-ko-he
. Geronimo proud. Now, we must talk and I must honor word to return to reservation.”
Shoz-Dijiji whistled for his horse, which came promptly. He climbed into the saddle and pointed westward. “I know a hidden spring where we can talk unobserved.”
Geronimo grunted. “Me drink from that spring little while ago.”
At the spring, secluded in a small canyon, his father watched as Shoz-Dijiji retrieved items from his saddle bags, pulled together some dried mesquite brush, made a small fire, put a small coffee pot of water near it to heat, and threw in a handful of coffee beans. From a cloth, he unwrapped two sandwiches, giving one to Geronimo.
Geronimo lifted one slice of bread and looked at the filling suspiciously. “What is?”
“Refried beans, Father.”
Geronimo grunted. “Why not kill cow? Have beef. Beef better than beans.”
“Times are hard. The cows are our only chance to make money. They are too few and precious for us to eat.”
Geronimo shook his head but wolfed down the sandwich. Shoz-Dijiji watched until he finished, then handed over his own sandwich. It, too, disappeared rapidly. Geronimo accepted a tin cup of the cowboy coffee from the pot and relaxed.
“Shoz-Dijiji is happy with his white woman?”
“Yes,” Shoz-Dijiji answered simply. Then, after a moment, added, “It great shock when Geronimo told me I was white, taken as a baby. A greater shock when Geronimo urged me leave the Apache way.”
“Usen has turned his back. The Apache way is dead. You must accept your white side and live as one. Shoz-Dijiji must join strengths of both Apache and white-eyes to become as great in his new world as he was in the Apache world.”
“And how do I do that, Father?”
The old man shrugged. “Not know. Your problem. Geronimo has spoken.” He reached for the small sack that he had brought from his horse. “Now Geronimo give Shoz-Dijiji two things, hidden for years.”
A small gold locket was first. Geronimo opened it and passed it over. “Your real father. Locket was around your mother’s neck.”
Next, Geronimo removed a leatherbound book, a family Bible. “Their book of great magic.” Geronimo opened it to the first page and showed where there was a handwritten list. “Important things,” he said.
“What are they?” Shoz-Dijiji asked.
Geronimo shrugged. “I cannot read this. You are the white-eyes now.” But he smiled and patted Shoz-Dijiji’s leg. “Ask your beautiful white woman. Now Geronimo has spoken his last and will go back to reservation.”
Geronimo stood and moved toward his horse.
“You will always be my father,” Shoz-Dijiji said.
Geronimo paused without turning. “I know, my son. Geronimo knows and is pleased. He is glad he kept Juh from killing you.”
The old man then mounted and rode away. Shoz-Dijiji watched until he was out of sight. Then he reverently returned the two gifts to the sack, set aside the coffee pot to cool, put out the fire, and erased the signs that the area had been used. Old habits but good ones, he thought. Down deep, he was still an Apache warrior despite his cowboy hat and the spurs on his boots.
Riding back to the ranch headquarters, Shoz-Dijiji allowed himself a small glimmer of hope. His courtship of the beautiful Wichita, his dear Chita, had slowed. Both waited to see if she could truly love an Indian—worse than just any Indian, an Apache devil, as the white-eyes called them. And he was
the
Apache Devil, now off the war trail forever.
Shoz-Dijiji knew Chita had accepted that she truly loved this Indian warrior. So he had decided to tell her finally and had been trying for the last few days to find a way of revealing his white parentage. Geronimo had given him the perfect way to tell her. He touched the sack holding the family Bible and locket tied to his saddle horn. Now he had proof of being white. Could this make the difference, for him most of all? Or was he lost between these two worlds—that of the Apache and of the whites—and must still find his way to her?
Beans For Supper Again
The headquarters of the Billings ranch had little enough to recommend it. Under three bedraggled cottonwood trees was a small ranch house that had not seen paint in many long years of being abraded by sandstorms rolling in off the high desert. A ramshackle barn and attached corral with a few weary-with-life horses, and a seriously Spartan bunkhouse concluded the facilities, other than an outhouse behind the bunkhouse. Smoke was coming from the bunkhouse’s tin stovepipe as Shoz-Dijiji—carrying the sack of treasured items given to him by Geronimo—walked over from unsaddling his horse at the barn. He had finished checking the fences, his chore for the day, and it was coming on to evening.
The bunkhouse had only two rooms. The larger had frames for several bunks—only three of which were now used—in an area where additional men had slept in more prosperous times, when Wichita’s father had been alive. Shoz-Dijiji slept in one of these, the other two cowboys still at the ranch in the other two.
It was into the second room that he entered—the combination kitchen and dining room, where the rest of the ranch’s inhabitants were sitting down to supper. The room had few furnishings. A stove was near one wall, the tin stovepipe disappearing up into the ceiling. Shelves near it held their few supplies—a little salt, some flour, and a few empty bottles and cans from better days. There was not much else except several large bags of beans leaning against the wall beneath the shelves. Beans were the staple of their diet during these times of hardship. Chung’s narrow cot stood in one corner—a shelf of his treasured cookbooks above it—and most of the remaining floor space was occupied by the large, rough-built table where they ate. Like the bunkroom built for a larger crew than now worked the Billings ranch, there was lots of extra room.
He solemnly greeted each person in turn—still not sure of how white-eyes interacted, usually being cautiously overly formal. There was his beautiful Wichita Billings, owner of the ranch but who ate with the hands because there was little enough food as it was. She was as strikingly wonderful to look at as when he first saved her life. He gave one of his rare smiles to her, recalling the look on her face when she had first seen a painted, all-but-naked warrior leaping down the steep canyon side toward her.
“Sit down, Shoz-Dijiji,” she said, returning his smile. “We are having Italian food tonight. Spaghetti!” She gestured to the remaining empty chair, next to her and saved for him.
Shoz-Dijiji had no idea what she was talking about. All he saw on the stove was the usual pot of beans. Beans were cheap, filling, and a survival food. It was all they had anymore except for a bit of bread now and then, but he knew they were running out of flour, and coffee, and just about anything else you could think of.
Before sitting, he greeted Luke Jensen, a short, young cowpuncher whose life he had saved also. For a bloodthirsty savage, he had certainly saved a lot of people, Shoz-Dijiji reflected. Now he was glad. Luke wore their uniform of faded denim and checked shirt, as did also Luis Mariel, once of Mexico and yet another saved by the savage Apache who was now their fellow cowboy or
vaquero
as Luis insisted they all were. Luis was also short, dark, and sported hair on his upper lip that hung down on each side of his mouth—he called it a
bandito
mustache. Everyone here was shorter than Shoz-Dijiji, he towered over them all. He sat down and looked to the remaining member of the ranch’s crew; Chung, the Chinese cook.
Chung was the oldest and smallest of them all, shorter even than Chita. Chung’s wrinkled face was always smiling, and the old cook loved jokes. His English was good, and he could actually read, devouring the cookbooks that old Mr. Billings’ wife, Chita’s mother, had brought to the ranch from the east many years ago. Chung placed a tin plate in front of Shoz-Dijiji, heaped with beans from the pot on the stove. He added a tin cup of black coffee.