Scarce had I touched the earth than I was upon my feet, dashing madly for the path by which I had entered this horrible valley.  A glance over my shoulder showed me the sithic engaged in pawing at the spear stuck through his lower jaw, and so busily engaged did he remain in this occupation that I had gained the safety of the cliff top before he was ready to take up the pursuit.  When he did not discover me in sight within the valley he dashed, hissing into the rank vegetation of the swamp and that was the last I saw of him.

X

PHUTRA AGAIN

I hastened to the cliff edge above Ja and helped him to a secure footing.  He would not listen to any thanks for his attempt to save me, which had come so near miscarrying.

“I had given you up for lost when you tumbled into the Mahar temple,” he said, “for not even I could save you from their clutches, and you may imagine my surprise when on seeing a canoe dragged up upon the beach of the mainland I discovered your own footprints in the sand beside it.

“I immediately set out in search of you, knowing as I did that you must be entirely unarmed and defenseless against the many dangers which lurk upon the mainland both in the form of savage beasts and reptiles, and men as well.  I had no difficulty in tracking you to this point.  It is well that I arrived when I did.”

“But why did you do it?” I asked, puzzled at this show of friendship on the part of a man of another world and a different race and color.

“You saved my life,” he replied; “from that moment it became my duty to protect and befriend you.  I would have been no true Mezop had I evaded my plain duty; but it was a pleasure in this instance for I like you.  I wish that you would come and live with me.  You shall become a member of my tribe.  Among us there is the best of hunting and fishing, and you shall have, to choose a mate from, the most beautiful girls of Pellucidar.  Will you come?”

I told him about Perry then, and Dian the Beautiful, and how my duty was to them first.  Afterward I should return and visit him—­if I could ever find his island.

“Oh, that is easy, my friend,” he said.  “You need merely to come to the foot of the highest peak of the Mountains of the Clouds.  There you will find a river which flows into the Lural Az.  Directly opposite the mouth of the river you will see three large islands far out, so far that they are barely discernible, the one to the extreme left as you face them from the mouth of the river is Anoroc, where I rule the tribe of Anoroc.”

“But how am I to find the Mountains of the Clouds?” I asked.  “Men say that they are visible from half Pellucidar,” he replied.

“How large is Pellucidar?” I asked, wondering what sort of theory these primitive men had concerning the form and substance of their world.