A horrid scream of bestial rage broke from the
banth as he felt warm flesh beneath his powerful talons.
As though his cry was but a signal to the others, the entire great
pack hurled themselves among the fighters. Panic reigned in an
instant. Thern and black man turned alike against the common enemy,
for the banths showed no partiality toward either.
The awful beasts bore down a hundred men by the mere weight of their
great bodies as they hurled themselves into the thick of the fight.
Leaping and clawing, they mowed down the warriors with their powerful
paws, turning for an instant to rend their victims with frightful
fangs.
The scene was fascinating in its terribleness, but suddenly it came
to me that we were wasting valuable time watching this conflict,
which in itself might prove a means of our escape.
The therns were so engaged with their terrible assailants that now,
if ever, escape should be comparatively easy. I turned to search
for an opening through the contending hordes. If we could but reach
the ramparts we might find that the pirates somewhere had thinned
the guarding forces and left a way open to us to the world without.
As my eyes wandered about the garden, the sight of the hundreds of
air craft lying unguarded around us suggested the simplest avenue
to freedom. Why it had not occurred to me before! I was thoroughly
familiar with the mechanism of every known make of flier on Barsoom.
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