Lost on Venus

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

I did not go in but sent word that I wished to speak to him upon a matter of great urgency, and a moment later I saw him coming from the house toward me.

"What brings you here, Carson?" he asked. "I thought you were spending the evening with Nalte."

When I told him what had happened he went very white. "There is no time to be lost!" he cried. "Can you find that house again?"

I told him that I could. "That doorway is indelibly burned into my memory."

"Dismiss your car; we will go in mine," he said, and a moment later we were speeding toward the place where I had lost Nalte.

"You have all my sympathy, my friend," said Ero Shan. "To have lost the woman you love, and such a woman! is a calamity beyond any feeble words to express."

"Yes," I replied, "and even if I had loved Nalte I could scarcely be more grieved than I now am."

"'Even if you had loved Nalte'!" he repeated incredulously. "But, man, you do love her, do you not?"

"We were only the best of friends," I replied. "Nalte did not love me."

Ero Shan made no reply, he drove swiftly on in silence. Presently we reached our destination. Ero Shan stopped his car beside the stairway, nearest the house, that led up to the walkway; and a moment later we were before the door.