Lost on Venus

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

"I am glad that you passed your examination successfully," I said as we started toward the Korgan Lat.

Nalte laughed joyously. "I just squeezed through," she admitted. "I wonder what they would say back in Andoo if they knew that I, the daughter of their jong, was considered fit only to scrub floors in Havatoo!" and again she laughed happily. It was plain to be seen that her pride had not suffered by reason of her assignment. "But after all," she continued, "it is a high honor to be considered fit to remain on any footing among such a race of super-men.

"And you! I am very proud of you, Carson Napier, for I have been told that you were elevated to a high place among them."

It was my turn to laugh now. "I did not pass the examination at all," I admitted. "I would have been destroyed but for my knowledge of a science that is unknown to Amtor. It was rather a jolt to my self esteem."

We drove along the Korgan Lat, through the great public park and parade ground in the center of which stands a magnificent stadium, and thus to the Avenue of the Gates which forms a great arc nearly eight miles long just inside the outer wall on the land side of Havatoo.

Here are the factories and the shops in the district included between the Avenue of Gates and the Yorgan Lat, a wide avenue a third of a mile inside the wall, all the principal shops being located along the Avenue of Gates. The avenue and the shops were brilliantly lighted, the street swarmed with vehicles, and the walkways at the level of the second stories were crowded with pedestrians.

We drove twice the full length of the avenue, enjoying the life and beauty of the scene; then we drove into one of the parking places, to which all of the ground floors on the main arteries are devoted, and were lifted by an escalator to the walkway on the level above.

Here shops displayed their wares in show windows, much as is the custom in American cities, though many of the displays aimed solely to please the eye rather than to call attention to the goods for sale within.

The scientists of Havatoo have developed a light that is brilliant and at the same time soft with which they attain effects impossible of achievement by our relatively crude lighting methods. At no place is the source of the light apparent; it casts soft shadows and gives forth no heat. Ordinarily it resembles sunlight, but it can also produce soft, pastel shades of various hues.

After we had enjoyed the spectacle for an hour, mingling with the happy crowd upon the walkway, I made a few small purchases, including a gift for Nalte; then we returned to my car, and I took my companion home.