At the Earth's Core Read online

  Produced by Judith Boss.

  At the Earth's Core

  By

  Edgar Rice Burroughs

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE I TOWARD THE ETERNAL FIRES II A STRANGE WORLD III A CHANGE OF MASTERS IV DIAN THE BEAUTIFUL V SLAVES VI THE BEGINNING OF HORROR VII FREEDOM VIII THE MAHAR TEMPLE IX THE FACE OF DEATH X PHUTRA AGAIN XI FOUR DEAD MAHARS XII PURSUIT XIII THE SLY ONE XIV THE GARDEN OF EDEN XV BACK TO EARTH

  PROLOGUE

  In the first place please bear in mind that I do not expect you tobelieve this story. Nor could you wonder had you witnessed a recentexperience of mine when, in the armor of blissful and stupendousignorance, I gaily narrated the gist of it to a Fellow of the RoyalGeological Society on the occasion of my last trip to London.

  You would surely have thought that I had been detected in no less aheinous crime than the purloining of the Crown Jewels from the Tower,or putting poison in the coffee of His Majesty the King.

  The erudite gentleman in whom I confided congealed before I was halfthrough!--it is all that saved him from exploding--and my dreams of anHonorary Fellowship, gold medals, and a niche in the Hall of Fame fadedinto the thin, cold air of his arctic atmosphere.

  But I believe the story, and so would you, and so would the learnedFellow of the Royal Geological Society, had you and he heard it fromthe lips of the man who told it to me. Had you seen, as I did, thefire of truth in those gray eyes; had you felt the ring of sincerity inthat quiet voice; had you realized the pathos of it all--you, too,would believe. You would not have needed the final ocular proof that Ihad--the weird rhamphorhynchus-like creature which he had brought backwith him from the inner world.

  I came upon him quite suddenly, and no less unexpectedly, upon the rimof the great Sahara Desert. He was standing before a goat-skin tentamidst a clump of date palms within a tiny oasis. Close by was an Arabdouar of some eight or ten tents.

  I had come down from the north to hunt lion. My party consisted of adozen children of the desert--I was the only "white" man. As weapproached the little clump of verdure I saw the man come from his tentand with hand-shaded eyes peer intently at us. At sight of me headvanced rapidly to meet us.

  "A white man!" he cried. "May the good Lord be praised! I have beenwatching you for hours, hoping against hope that THIS time there wouldbe a white man. Tell me the date. What year is it?"

  And when I had told him he staggered as though he had been struck fullin the face, so that he was compelled to grasp my stirrup leather forsupport.

  "It cannot be!" he cried after a moment. "It cannot be! Tell me thatyou are mistaken, or that you are but joking."

  "I am telling you the truth, my friend," I replied. "Why should Ideceive a stranger, or attempt to, in so simple a matter as the date?"

  For some time he stood in silence, with bowed head.

  "Ten years!" he murmured, at last. "Ten years, and I thought that atthe most it could be scarce more than one!" That night he told me hisstory--the story that I give you here as nearly in his own words as Ican recall them.

  I

  TOWARD THE ETERNAL FIRES

  I was born in Connecticut about thirty years ago. My name is DavidInnes. My father was a wealthy mine owner. When I was nineteen hedied. All his property was to be mine when I had attained mymajority--provided that I had devoted the two years intervening inclose application to the great business I was to inherit.

  I did my best to fulfil the last wishes of my parent--not because ofthe inheritance, but because I loved and honored my father. For sixmonths I toiled in the mines and in the counting-rooms, for I wished toknow every minute detail of the business.

  Then Perry interested me in his invention. He was an old fellow whohad devoted the better part of a long life to the perfection of amechanical subterranean prospector. As relaxation he studiedpaleontology. I looked over his plans, listened to his arguments,inspected his working model--and then, convinced, I advanced the fundsnecessary to construct a full-sized, practical prospector.

  I shall not go into the details of its construction--it lies out therein the desert now--about two miles from here. Tomorrow you may care toride out and see it. Roughly, it is a steel cylinder a hundred feetlong, and jointed so that it may turn and twist through solid rock ifneed be. At one end is a mighty revolving drill operated by an enginewhich Perry said generated more power to the cubic inch than any otherengine did to the cubic foot. I remember that he used to claim thatthat invention alone would make us fabulously wealthy--we were going tomake the whole thing public after the successful issue of our firstsecret trial--but Perry never returned from that trial trip, and I onlyafter ten years.

  I recall as it were but yesterday the night of that momentous occasionupon which we were to test the practicality of that wondrous invention.It was near midnight when we repaired to the lofty tower in which Perryhad constructed his "iron mole" as he was wont to call the thing. Thegreat nose rested upon the bare earth of the floor. We passed throughthe doors into the outer jacket, secured them, and then passing on intothe cabin, which contained the controlling mechanism within the innertube, switched on the electric lights.

  Perry looked to his generator; to the great tanks that held thelife-giving chemicals with which he was to manufacture fresh air toreplace that which we consumed in breathing; to his instruments forrecording temperatures, speed, distance, and for examining thematerials through which we were to pass.

  He tested the steering device, and overlooked the mighty cogs whichtransmitted its marvelous velocity to the giant drill at the nose ofhis strange craft.

  Our seats, into which we strapped ourselves, were so arranged upontransverse bars that we would be upright whether the craft wereploughing her way downward into the bowels of the earth, or runninghorizontally along some great seam of coal, or rising vertically towardthe surface again.

  At length all was ready. Perry bowed his head in prayer. For a momentwe were silent, and then the old man's hand grasped the starting lever.There was a frightful roaring beneath us--the giant frame trembled andvibrated--there was a rush of sound as the loose earth passed upthrough the hollow space between the inner and outer jackets to bedeposited in our wake. We were off!

  The noise was deafening. The sensation was frightful. For a fullminute neither of us could do aught but cling with the proverbialdesperation of the drowning man to the handrails of our swinging seats.Then Perry glanced at the thermometer.

  "Gad!" he cried, "it cannot be possible--quick! What does the distancemeter read?"

  That and the speedometer were both on my side of the cabin, and as Iturned to take a reading from the former I could see Perry muttering.

  "Ten degrees rise--it cannot be possible!" and then I saw him tugfrantically upon the steering wheel.

  As I finally found the tiny needle in the dim light I translatedPerry's evident excitement, and my heart sank within me. But when Ispoke I hid the fear which haunted me. "It will be seven hundred feet,Perry," I said, "by the time you can turn her into the horizontal."

  "You'd better lend me a hand then, my boy," he replied, "for I cannotbudge her out of the vertical alone. God give that our combinedstrength may be equal to the task, for else we are lost."

  I wormed my way to the old man's side with never a doubt but that thegreat wheel would yield on the instant to the power of my young andvigorous muscles. Nor was my belief mere vanity, for always had myphysique been the envy and despair of my fellows. And for that veryreason it had waxed even greater than nature had intended, since mynatural pride in my great strength had led me to care for and developmy body and my muscles by every means within my power. What withboxing, football, and baseball, I had been in tr
aining since childhood.

  And so it was with the utmost confidence that I laid hold of the hugeiron rim; but though I threw every ounce of my strength into it, mybest effort was as unavailing as Perry's had been--the thing would notbudge--the grim, insensate, horrible thing that was holding us upon thestraight road to death!

  At length I gave up the useless struggle, and without a word returnedto my seat. There was no need for words--at least none that I couldimagine, unless Perry desired to pray. And I was quite sure that hewould, for he never left an opportunity neglected where he mightsandwich in a prayer. He prayed when he arose in the morning, heprayed before he ate, he prayed when he had finished eating, and beforehe went to bed at night he prayed again. In between he often foundexcuses to pray even when the provocation seemed far-fetched to myworldly eyes--now that he was about to die I felt positive that Ishould witness a perfect orgy of prayer--if one may allude with such asimile to so solemn an act.

  But to my astonishment I discovered that with death staring him in theface Abner Perry was transformed into a new being. From his lips thereflowed--not prayer--but a clear and limpid stream of undilutedprofanity, and it was all directed at that quietly stubborn piece ofunyielding mechanism.

  "I should think, Perry," I chided, "that a man of your professedreligiousness would rather be at his prayers than cursing in thepresence of imminent death."

  "Death!" he cried. "Death is it that appalls you? That is nothing bycomparison with the loss the world must suffer. Why, David within thisiron cylinder we have demonstrated possibilities that science hasscarce dreamed. We have harnessed a new principle, and with itanimated a piece of steel with the power of ten thousand men. That twolives will be snuffed out is nothing to the world calamity that entombsin the bowels of the earth the discoveries that I have made and provedin the successful construction of the thing that is now carrying usfarther and farther toward the eternal central fires."

  I am frank to admit that for myself I was much more concerned with ourown immediate future than with any problematic loss which the worldmight be about to suffer. The world was at least ignorant of itsbereavement, while to me it was a real and terrible actuality.

  "What can we do?" I asked, hiding my perturbation beneath the mask of alow and level voice.

  "We may stop here, and die of asphyxiation when our atmosphere tanksare empty," replied Perry, "or we may continue on with the slight hopethat we may later sufficiently deflect the prospector from the verticalto carry us along the arc of a great circle which must eventuallyreturn us to the surface. If we succeed in so doing before we reachthe higher internal temperature we may even yet survive. There wouldseem to me to be about one chance in several million that we shallsucceed--otherwise we shall die more quickly but no more surely than asthough we sat supinely waiting for the torture of a slow and horribledeath."

  I glanced at the thermometer. It registered 110 degrees. While wewere talking the mighty iron mole had bored its way over a mile intothe rock of the earth's crust.

  "Let us continue on, then," I replied. "It should soon be over at thisrate. You never intimated that the speed of this thing would be sohigh, Perry. Didn't you know it?"

  "No," he answered. "I could not figure the speed exactly, for I had noinstrument for measuring the mighty power of my generator. I reasoned,however, that we should make about five hundred yards an hour."

  "And we are making seven miles an hour," I concluded for him, as I satwith my eyes upon the distance meter. "How thick is the Earth's crust,Perry?" I asked.

  "There are almost as many conjectures as to that as there aregeologists," was his answer. "One estimates it thirty miles, becausethe internal heat, increasing at the rate of about one degree to eachsixty to seventy feet depth, would be sufficient to fuse the mostrefractory substances at that distance beneath the surface. Anotherfinds that the phenomena of precession and nutation require that theearth, if not entirely solid, must at least have a shell not less thaneight hundred to a thousand miles in thickness. So there you are. Youmay take your choice."

  "And if it should prove solid?" I asked.

  "It will be all the same to us in the end, David," replied Perry. "Atthe best our fuel will suffice to carry us but three or four days,while our atmosphere cannot last to exceed three. Neither, then, issufficient to bear us in the safety through eight thousand miles ofrock to the antipodes."

  "If the crust is of sufficient thickness we shall come to a final stopbetween six and seven hundred miles beneath the earth's surface; butduring the last hundred and fifty miles of our journey we shall becorpses. Am I correct?" I asked.

  "Quite correct, David. Are you frightened?"

  "I do not know. It all has come so suddenly that I scarce believe thateither of us realizes the real terrors of our position. I feel that Ishould be reduced to panic; but yet I am not. I imagine that the shockhas been so great as to partially stun our sensibilities."

  Again I turned to the thermometer. The mercury was rising with lessrapidity. It was now but 140 degrees, although we had penetrated to adepth of nearly four miles. I told Perry, and he smiled.

  "We have shattered one theory at least," was his only comment, and thenhe returned to his self-assumed occupation of fluently cursing thesteering wheel. I once heard a pirate swear, but his best effortswould have seemed like those of a tyro alongside of Perry's masterfuland scientific imprecations.

  Once more I tried my hand at the wheel, but I might as well haveessayed to swing the earth itself. At my suggestion Perry stopped thegenerator, and as we came to rest I again threw all my strength into asupreme effort to move the thing even a hair's breadth--but the resultswere as barren as when we had been traveling at top speed.

  I shook my head sadly, and motioned to the starting lever. Perrypulled it toward him, and once again we were plunging downward towardeternity at the rate of seven miles an hour. I sat with my eyes gluedto the thermometer and the distance meter. The mercury was rising veryslowly now, though even at 145 degrees it was almost unbearable withinthe narrow confines of our metal prison.

  About noon, or twelve hours after our start upon this unfortunatejourney, we had bored to a depth of eighty-four miles, at which pointthe mercury registered 153 degrees F.

  Perry was becoming more hopeful, although upon what meager food hesustained his optimism I could not conjecture. From cursing he hadturned to singing--I felt that the strain had at last affected hismind. For several hours we had not spoken except as he asked me forthe readings of the instruments from time to time, and I announcedthem. My thoughts were filled with vain regrets. I recalled numerousacts of my past life which I should have been glad to have had a fewmore years to live down. There was the affair in the Latin Commons atAndover when Calhoun and I had put gunpowder in the stove--and nearlykilled one of the masters. And then--but what was the use, I was aboutto die and atone for all these things and several more. Already theheat was sufficient to give me a foretaste of the hereafter. A fewmore degrees and I felt that I should lose consciousness.

  "What are the readings now, David?" Perry's voice broke in upon mysomber reflections.

  "Ninety miles and 153 degrees," I replied.

  "Gad, but we've knocked that thirty-mile-crust theory into a cockedhat!" he cried gleefully.

  "Precious lot of good it will do us," I growled back.

  "But my boy," he continued, "doesn't that temperature reading meananything to you? Why it hasn't gone up in six miles. Think of it,son!"

  "Yes, I'm thinking of it," I answered; "but what difference will itmake when our air supply is exhausted whether the temperature is 153degrees or 153,000? We'll be just as dead, and no one will know thedifference, anyhow." But I must admit that for some unaccountablereason the stationary temperature did renew my waning hope. What Ihoped for I could not have explained, nor did I try. The very fact, asPerry took pains to explain, of the blasting of several very exact andlearned scientific hypotheses made it apparent that we cou
ld not knowwhat lay before us within the bowels of the earth, and so we mightcontinue to hope for the best, at least until we were dead--when hopewould no longer be essential to our happiness. It was very good, andlogical reasoning, and so I embraced it.

  At one hundred miles the temperature had DROPPED TO 152 1/2 DEGREES!When I announced it Perry reached over and hugged me.

  From then on until noon of the second day, it continued to drop untilit became as uncomfortably cold as it had been unbearably hot before.At the depth of two hundred and forty miles our nostrils were assailedby almost overpowering ammonia fumes, and the temperature had droppedto TEN BELOW ZERO! We suffered nearly two hours of this intense andbitter cold, until at about two hundred and forty-five miles from thesurface of the earth we entered a stratum of solid ice, when themercury quickly rose to 32 degrees. During the next three hours wepassed through ten miles of ice, eventually emerging into anotherseries of ammonia-impregnated strata, where the mercury again fell toten degrees below zero.

  Slowly it rose once more until we were convinced that at last we werenearing the molten interior of the earth. At four hundred miles thetemperature had reached 153 degrees. Feverishly I watched thethermometer. Slowly it rose. Perry had ceased singing and was at lastpraying.

  Our hopes had received such a deathblow that the gradually increasingheat seemed to our distorted imaginations much greater than it reallywas. For another hour I saw that pitiless column of mercury rise andrise until at four hundred and ten miles it stood at 153 degrees. Nowit was that we began to hang upon those readings in almost breathlessanxiety.

  One hundred and fifty-three degrees had been the maximum temperatureabove the ice stratum. Would it stop at this point again, or would itcontinue its merciless climb? We knew that there was no hope, and yetwith the persistence of life itself we continued to hope againstpractical certainty.

  Already the air tanks were at low ebb--there was barely enough of theprecious gases to sustain us for another twelve hours. But would we bealive to know or care? It seemed incredible.

  At four hundred and twenty miles I took another reading.

  "Perry!" I shouted. "Perry, man! She's going down! She's going down!She's 152 degrees again."

  "Gad!" he cried. "What can it mean? Can the earth be cold at thecenter?"

  "I do not know, Perry," I answered; "but thank God, if I am to die itshall not be by fire--that is all that I have feared. I can face thethought of any death but that."

  Down, down went the mercury until it stood as low as it had seven milesfrom the surface of the earth, and then of a sudden the realizationbroke upon us that death was very near. Perry was the first todiscover it. I saw him fussing with the valves that regulate the airsupply. And at the same time I experienced difficulty in breathing.My head felt dizzy--my limbs heavy.

  I saw Perry crumple in his seat. He gave himself a shake and sat erectagain. Then he turned toward me.

  "Good-bye, David," he said. "I guess this is the end," and then hesmiled and closed his eyes.

  "Good-bye, Perry, and good luck to you," I answered, smiling back athim. But I fought off that awful lethargy. I was very young--I didnot want to die.

  For an hour I battled against the cruelly enveloping death thatsurrounded me upon all sides. At first I found that by climbing highinto the framework above me I could find more of the preciouslife-giving elements, and for a while these sustained me. It must havebeen an hour after Perry had succumbed that I at last came to therealization that I could no longer carry on this unequal struggleagainst the inevitable.

  With my last flickering ray of consciousness I turned mechanicallytoward the distance meter. It stood at exactly five hundred miles fromthe earth's surface--and then of a sudden the huge thing that bore uscame to a stop. The rattle of hurtling rock through the hollow jacketceased. The wild racing of the giant drill betokened that it wasrunning loose in AIR--and then another truth flashed upon me. Thepoint of the prospector was ABOVE us. Slowly it dawned on me thatsince passing through the ice strata it had been above. We had turnedin the ice and sped upward toward the earth's crust. Thank God! Wewere safe!

  I put my nose to the intake pipe through which samples were to havebeen taken during the passage of the prospector through the earth, andmy fondest hopes were realized--a flood of fresh air was pouring intothe iron cabin. The reaction left me in a state of collapse, and Ilost consciousness.