But I got no further, for the queen thundered: “Stop! I find the prisoner guilty by his own admission. Further evidence is superfluous, and I shall proceed to sentence. Has any one any suggestions to make on this subject?”
Whereupon my old friend the Professor of Anatomy stepped forward. Doggo had evidently primed him to do me a good turn, for he said:
“The prisoner is neither a Cupian nor a Formian, nor is it apparent just what sort of animal he is. He seems to be a reasoning species, and so can be tried for a crime and accorded the same privileges of trial as in the case of a member of either of the two recognized reasoning species of this planet. But, as he is an unknown type of creature, it is extremely likely that his flesh would prove harmful to the royal babies. Accordingly, for the good of the Empire, I advise that Your Majesty impose the more severe of the alternative sentences, namely, the Valley of the Howling Rocks.”
As no one else present had any suggestion to make, Queen Formis and the council conferred together for a few moments, and then the sentence was announced. As I hoped, it was the Valley. The professor had done well!
Convicted criminals on Poros are not kept in suspense day after day, as on earth. We started for the Valley the very next morning. Apparently an execution is an important state occasion on this planet, for a long line of kerkools trailed out of the Imperial City, carrying the queen, several of the council, and some lesser dignitaries, as well as Doggo, Tabby, myself, and my guards.
Doggo was deeply touched by grief. But, for myself, I was still unable to get up any very great excitement over the affair. Perhaps I am a fatalist, but I could not believe that I was really going to die. It all seemed like a dream from which I was soon about to awake. And even if I should appear to die on this planet, was it not likely that I would awake on the earth again in my Boston laboratory, and thus put an end to a very interesting set of imaginary adventures?
But at this thought a pang stabbed my heart, and I resolved that I had rather actually die than have it turn out that my meeting with the Princess Lilla had not been a fact.
The authorities permitted me to write her a note of farewell, and Doggo guaranteed to deliver it personally, thus assuring that it would get past Yuri. Into this letter I crowded all my pent-up love, and urged her to feel no regrets at my having been sacrificed in her behalf, as that sacrifice was gladly and happily given.
Then I patted my little pet Tabby farewell, turned her over to Doggo’s care, and was led by my executioners to the edge of the abyss. It was a harmless enough looking gulch, but the scores of human skeletons and ant shells, scattered about the bottom, bore mute witness to its dread possibilities.
And witness, not mute, was borne by the volume of noise which rolled up over the edge of the valley. I had thought that I had heard the limit of stupendous sound when years ago I stood at the brink of the Niagara, but the roar which arose from the Valley of the Howling Rocks dwarfed even Niagara by comparison.