"11 - John Carter of Mars" - читать интересную книгу автора (Burroughs Edgar Rice)

"Yes, I noticed," replied the earthman. "They are all looking into the sky
toward the city."
"Look," whispered Dejah Thoris. "It's the same thing upon which the ape rode
when he captured me in the Helium Forest after shooting our thoat!"
There appeared in the sky, coming from the direction of the city, a great, lone
bird upon whose back rode a single man.
The earthman's keen eyes squinted for an instant. "The bird is a malagor. Pew
Mogel is riding it."
The bird and its rider circled directly overhead.
"Open the east gate," Pew Mogel commanded, his voice ringing out through a
loudspeaker somewhere in the arena. The gates were thrown open and there began
pouring out into the arena wave after wave of malagors exactly like the bird Pew
Mogel rode.
As the malagors came out, column after column of apes were waiting at the
entrance to vault onto the birds' backs. As each bird was mounted, it rose into
the air by telepathic command to join a constantly growing formation circling
high overhead.
The mounting of the birds must have taken nearly two hours, so great were the
number of Pew Mogel's apes and birds. Carter noticed that upon each ape's back
was strapped a rifle and each bird itself carried a varying assortment of
military equipment, including ammunition supplies, small cannon; and a
sub-machine gun was carried by each flight platoon.
At last all was ready and Pew Mogel descended down over the cages of his three
captives.
"You see, now, Pew Mogel's mighty army," he cried, "with which he will first
conquer Helium and then all Barsoom." The man seemed very confident, for his
crooked, misshapen body sat very straight upon his feathered mount.
"Before you are chewed to bits by the reptiles in the rising water below you,"
he said, "you will have a few moments to consider the fate that awaits Helium
within the next forty-eight hours. I should have preferred to conquer
peacefully; but you interfered. For that, you die, slowly and horribly."
Pew Mogel turned to the only ape that was left in the arena, the keeper of the
key to the cages.
"Open the flood-gate!" was his single command before he rose up to lead his
troops off toward the north.
Accompanying the weird, flying army in a sling carried by a hundred malagors
rode Joog, the synthetic giant. A hollow, mirthless laugh peeled like thunder
from the giant's throat as he was borne away into the sky.
Eight
THE REPTILE PIT
AS THE LAST BIRD in Pew Mogel's fantastic army flapped out of sight behind the
rim of the crater, John Carter turned to Tars Tarkas in the cage hanging beside
him. He spoke softly, so that Dejah Thoris would not hear.
"Those creatures will make Helium a formidable enemy," he said. "Kantos Kan's
splended airfleet and infantry will be hard pressed against those thousands of
apes equipped with human brains and modern armament, mounted upon fast birds of
prey!"
"Kantos Kan and his airfleet are not even in Helium to protect the city,"
announced Tars Tarkas grimly. "I heard Pew Mogel bragging that he had sent
Kantos Kan a false message, supposedly from you, urging that all Helium's fleet,