“Let’s go straight ahead,” decided Jack.
“Sure,” assented Jim, and before they had gone a dozen paces, the gnome’s sharp eyes had made a discovery. He pointed across the plain.
“A guy is headin’ toward us, boss,” he said. “Let’s clear the decks fur action, till we fin’s what he wants!”
CHAPTER IX
TORPEON’S MARK
THE newcomer was a pleasant-looking young fellow, of about Jack’s age, and similarly attired, though in different colors. He came swiftly forward, with arm upraised in a friendly greeting. “Welcome, Jack!” exclaimed he. He laid his right hand on Jack’s breast, over the heart—apparently the Saturnian mode of accost. “And this must be Jim,” he added, smiling at the urchin: “you are welcome, both. Lamara, our highest, sent me to find and attend you. My name is Argon. I would have reached you sooner, but Torpeon, the arch mischief-maker, deflected your course hither, so that you landed far from the point where we were looking for you. Has he annoyed you?”
“We had a little argument,” replied Jack modestly. “But he made an assertion as to a lady in whom I am interested, which gave me some anxiety.”
“Miriam: yes!” answered the other. “She arrived here safely a few days ago, and Lamara assigned my sister Zarga to take care of her: Zarga is the best-loved and most trusted handmaid of the Highest. But Torpeon seems to have got information about her from some source yet undiscovered; there is even reason to suspect treason, and an investigation is being made. At any rate, he succeeded in gaining access to her at a moment when she was alone, and though he inflicted no actual injury, he was able to put his mark on her, which may suffice to put her to some inconvenience. Otherwise she is well, and eager, I needn’t say, to meet her friend from New York.”
“His mark!” repeated Jack, frowning. “What is that, and how does it affect her?”
“Torpeon is a skilful magician,” said Argon. “Magic, among us, is condemned and forbidden as an evil; but we have learned to control nature by studying and adapting her laws. But magic is dominant on Tor: the Torides are an unruly and turbulent people, and for many generations they have been hostile to us. We never make war but we have means of passive resistance which are effective; so that though long ago the Torides used to make raids on us occasionally, they have now mostly given them up. Torpeon himself, however, sometimes comes here: and though he can do no hurt to us Saturnians, he is always on the watch for some visitor from another planet, who would be more subject to his arts. Miriam had come to us unexpectedly, and he laid a plot to kidnap her, with the idea, I presume, that she might be of use to him in his designs, which are very ambitious.”
While Argon thus discoursed, he was leading his friends in the direction of a long, bright line upon the horizon, which might be the ocean.